Chapter 30:
They had spent hours in the cramped confines of an airship, beating their way across the skies. Their awful host had done little to offer comfort and said little enough to suggest that they weren't being taken somewhere ugly for ill purpose. Othman was in quite a state, just now. Lady Nicia thought he was having problems with his heart. He wasn't a terribly old man, but the sorts of things they were dealing with could challenge the health of a young man.
Nicia herself had spent hours pacing in her cramped little room. Just four steps to the door and four steps back to her bed, was all she had, but she'd been pacing and pacing and pacing the whole way. Her mind wanted to believe that this was alright. She wanted to think that there was a hope here. Why would Gordon have need to haul them away somewhere, when he could simply blow their brains out or shove them out a door and let them fall? Now, finally, they were stopped.
They'd stopped sometime in the night. Nicia had felt rather than seen the ship descending out of the sky. With the rising of the sun, she'd washed and dressed, reasoning that they might finally get an answer. Shortly after her meager breakfast had been put on the little table in her room, the master spy's enforcers had come down to collect her. Now she found herself looking out the windows of his office and down at the overgrown lands beneath the ship.
There was something eerily familiar about the scenery below the ship's windows. As Nicia scanned the scene, Othman was brought in, looking as if he hadn't slept a wink the night before. His mind was on all the ugly things that happened to a traitor's family when his overlord figured out what he'd been up to. He saw visions of his wife and daughters being treated to every sort of ugliness imaginable.
"Good morning," Gordon Wells offered. He was noxiously chipper today. He was seated in that chair with his back to them, looking out the airship's window at the scene below them. As a patch of fog cleared on the ground, Nicia caught sight of a terrifyingly familiar structure. The Spire of Beauty! Her brown eyes got big as plates at the sight. "Why are we here," she demanded? "Do you know what this place is?" Gordon did indeed know where they were. "This is where we're going to retrieve enough death metal to power a dozen machines," he responded.
Far to the east, a small convoy of vehicles rolled into a tiny village of a few hundred souls, bearing a distinguished visitor. The folk of the village lived a quiet life, and they'd never seen any sort of trouble over the centuries since the people from the east had come to buy their food and offer protection. Now, strangers were here bringing war and destruction.
Out on the village green, the vehicles stopped, and an eclectic group of strangers got down. Their leader was a tall, bear of a man with a mane of long, blonde hair and piercing blue eyes. Folk of the village knew him by name and reputation, if not by sight. Finn, last of the Humans, now King of all the world, had come to their humble home.
At his command, his soldiers went and gathered in the village elders, putting them on benches and sections of tree-trunk there on the green. As armed men stood watch, the big man sat himself down before the elders. Nobody on the green had seen such an august personality in their little slice of the world in their lifetimes. A few found themselves wondering if ever anybody so important had come to their land. Resting his hands on his knees, the King of Ooo shared a smile with the village headman and announced, "hey... Let's talk about what's been going on..."
Miles to the southeast, Kaito walked up onto the town's wall-walk to find his master pacing back and forth in manic fashion. The train was off the track. Kaito knew it as well as anybody, though he'd been doing his best to try and keep the men calm and on topic. They had never expected a threat to come at them from an equal force. The Grid-Face people were the nearest threats to them, and they were pacifists. They'd reckoned without the reaction of the so-called King of Ooo.
He was cunning and clever and everything the stories said. And, more to the point, he seemed bound and determined to push them back to the home-islands, even if it needed force to do the job. He'd been trailing them since they'd pulled back from Sonbong. Their spyship's cameras had brought back images of the powerful army the King had brought with him, and it had Kaito very worried.
Tanks and guns, thought the ex-policeman. The King had brought machines that were the lowest grade of technology that he could apply to the problem. The more dangerous issue was the men. He'd brought thousands of men. Those men could be used to slip in close, as at Sonbong, and they could wreak havoc on the under-defended war-machines that Lord Nagumo had brought.
Seeing his lieutenant there at the stairs, the Lord turned to Kaito and asked, "are my machines in position?" Kaito responded, "we have all the war-machines set up in places where they can provide overlapping defensive fire. There's... There are still risks, my lord. The sea defenses are non-existent. While the one machine stationed to the south can control the approaches against ships, we're vulnerable to men swimming in after dark. We don't have..." Tatsuo shut him up with a sharp motion of his hand. He clearly wasn't interested in what they didn't have.
"When do the first conscripts go into training," he demanded? "Tomorrow, sir," Kaito replied. "We've... we took them from the recruit class of policemen." It was only a couple hundred men and not nearly enough against the need. "I need that ramped up, Kaito," growled the lord. "People are asking questions, master," his lieutenant replied. "They're asking why we are building machines for war and where the princess is."
They needed a new plan. They were holding this place. Barely. Finn could come and take it, whenever he chose. It all came down to how many lives he wanted to put at risk and what nasty little strategems of war he could come up with in that deadly mind of his. Taking a great risk–knowing how it would enrage his master–Kaito rumbled, "lord... we must leave this place." "You would shame our soldiers," howled Tatsuo! Shaking his head, Kaito said, "we have no choice. There's no way we can hold without ground troops. If he were less squeamish, he would have taken the town already."
His master knew the truth. Kaito could see it. "Let us fall back to our redoubt, master," the younger man offered. "We are unassailable there. We'd still have our force here on the mainland. We still threaten the towns of the mainland, and he cannot reach us." Tatsuo spat curses. Insistently, Kaito said, "let me call in our transports. That lets us save our weapons until we can make them more effective..."
As the warlord argued with his lieutenant over courses of action, in the wild lands between King's Island and Tequila Kingdom, Maja the Sky Witch sat down beside her stepdaughter. The tall blonde's eyes were shut. You might not even have been able to tell she was breathing. "I'm listening, Mmms," Fionna burbled. The Sky Witch asked, "can you see the flaw?" The Bad Bunny's cute little nose wrinkled, and she asked, "why did he stop working in the middle?" Maja's face whipped around. "You kinda' have to keep going with these things," Fionna murmured. "If you don't, you get mistakes like this."
Maja's face was red hot when Fionna opened her eyes. "You can't kill him," Fi rumbled. "Daddy doesn't like murder..." "Can you fix it," Maja asked? Fionna kept her waiting a moment. When the Sky Witch was clearly growing anxious, the tall woman responded, "now that I know where the problem is? Yes." In the right now, it was time for Maja to go to bed. She'd been grinding pretty hard on this.
"You're not my mother," Maja rumbled, as she stood up. Momentarily, she was doubled over in pain. It was just what Randy had been afraid of. Fionna had a sense for what a woman in labor looked like, and Maja had been through hell giving birth to her little brother before this. "You're my mother," Fionna replied, as she climbed to her feet. Showing shocking strength, the tall girl hefted the witch with one arm and began the climb out of the engine room.
Worried faces watched as the Bad Bunny lay the witch out on a pallet in the cargo hold. "Giving birth," Fi announced. "This is normal. She's going to be ok. We all are." One of the strangers in that space stepped forward, declaring, "I'm a nurse. Let's get her propped up and prepped." Which was music to Fionna's ears. Much as she was ready for whatever, she wasn't going to turn down the help of a professional. In short order, the nurse was directing traffic, sending somebody to get water boiled, scrounging up the little medical kit they had, and getting ready to bring Fionna's newest sister into the world.
The following morning found her older sister standing at the back of the land-ship's little parlor, swilling coffee, waiting on what their father was going to do. The King had awakened with his mind fresh and focused. He'd come down the stairs, ordered up breakfast, and sat there for a few minutes, humming to himself and scratching on a piece of paper. It was a peculiar sign from Bonnie's dad. She'd never seen him like that before. "He's got a plan," rumbled Jay. Bonnie glanced up to find her brother at her elbow.
Jay was, if anything, the antithesis of their dad. Her big brother was restless. He seemed to seethe with barely contained energy today. He'd been in and out of the ship, muttering to himself and pacing, while their dad worked at whatever it was that he was doing. From time to time, the King of Ooo would stop, glance down at the sketch that Jake Junior had made for him, then return to his humming and note-making. It was clear to Bonnie from looking at him, that her brother was right. Her father's rest had apparently done him a world of good, because now he seemed to be focused and ready.
Jake came slipping down the stairs, looking natty in a knee-length dress in a sky-blue hue. It was the first dress Bonnie had seen her wear. How does she make it slutty, thought the pillow-person? Somehow the King's mistress never failed to make an entrance. It was a skill that left Bonnie mystified.
Sure enough, as the shapechanger went sauntering by, ass wig-wagging like a two-coin harlot, Bonnie found herself gawping. This particular dress came open in the back, from Jake's narrow shoulders almost all the way to the crack of her ass. Bonnie didn't have to look around to know that the various soldiers and officers gathered near the King were looking. They didn't really have a choice.
Finn glanced up as his mistress approached the table, and his face immediately went hot. She was going braless today, letting those plump knobs swing free with every step she made. A part of him wanted her to go right back upstairs and change. They were going into a fight. The man in him decided that could wait until later. Right now, he was enjoying the view.
"Your Majesty," she greeted him in her soft voice. "Ms. Rainicorn," Finn replied. Pointing to the map she'd marked up, the big man asked, "about how far from the trees would you say the castles are?" Jake frowned a moment, her mind going back to the distance she'd walked. "Mmm," she murmured, "maybe four or five miles." It was a long way for a dude to run, while those things were shooting at him. It was just as far to try driving in one of those tanks with bursts of light hitting you from every side.
Finn only smiled when she raised those issues. Her boo was up to something. She could see it in his eyes. Coming around to his side of the table, she tried to peak at his notes, but Finn put them away. Turning to his general, the big man said, "get the army ready to move. We're going up here to the forest." "Dangerous," General Ultrich rumbled.
His mind was on the risk of getting within line of sight of those machines. Visions of slaughter were dancing in his head. "Old growth forest," the King announced. "Those machines can't see or shoot through it effectively." The trees grew thick and wild here. The locals he'd talked to didn't even like going into the forest to forage for food. "As you wish," the general rumbled, as he headed out of the land-ship's hatch.
As the sun rose over the former Kingdom of Beauty, Gordon Wells watched his scouts coming back aboard his airship. Their faces were grim, which was to be expected. He'd sent them out into the teeth of the ugly land below to secure the information he needed. He was scarcely surprised to find that three of the men were missing–likely dead.
Gordon spent no time mourning them. They were expendable lackeys. Several of the men who'd gone might well have been Orzsebet's creatures. He was satisfied to see that one of those was among the men who was missing. Let her glean information from his corpse! Gordon headed for the conference room, beckoning the leader of the expedition to follow. This wasn't a matter for prying eyes or ears.
Arriving in the narrow dining room, the master spy went up the length of the room, closing the shutters as he went. When all the rooms were shut, the spy sat himself at the head of the table and beckoned for his agent to approach. Striding up the room, the burly, blonde giant declared, "two of the rocket-tubes are occupied..." He'd been almost on top of the first when the radiation counter went off. The second was noticeable from a fairly long distance.
Gordon frowned pensively. It was just as Chelsea Robard had thought. Princess Beautiful guarded mushroom bombs. She'd thought there would be only one, but apparently there was more than that here. Clearly one is badly damaged if it's leaking, thought Gordon. He wasn't sure it was even safe to try for that one, even without the risk of dealing with the mad creature that haunted this wasted land.
"Activity," he asked? "The one that's leaking had a great deal of tracks in and around the entry. There were signs that someone had been digging there. "That'll be the one Chelsea went for," Gordon rumbled. Chelsea had very nearly lost her life in those tunnels. Princess Beautiful guarded that thing jealously. "We don't want that one anyway," he said. "Prepare for a recovery operation. We'll need to uncover the hinge mechanism for the lid and make ready to lift it out of the way." The weapon in that tube would give them anywhere between three and six bombs to cannibalize for death-metal. That would give them between nine and eighteen iron-soldiers. The wax-hustler wanted to chafe his hands in unholy glee. This was a far better solution than an assault on the Jungle Kingdom.
Later that same day, in the forest, north of Kun-Som, Finn the King stepped out of the truck that had brought him. Beside him, Jake Junior stepped out of the truck, still wearing that fabulously sexy dress. She'd even put on the matching heels. When he'd told her to go get changed for the fight, Jake had refused. They'd had a bit of a staring contest, with Finn finally backing down. He knew what this was about. If she was dressed that way, she was hardly prepared for a battle. If she wasn't going into a fight, then Finn wasn't going either.
He'd gotten used to having his bodyguards obey him. Mostly. They did as he asked them to, following him into some pretty tough spots. Jake was... different. She was nothing like her father, who'd not only been right there at Finn's side, doing scary, hair-raising shit, but actually egging Finn on. Jake had often challenged Finn, matching him reckless-act for reckless-act, because that was what brothers did. Girlfriends? Not so much. And it scarcely mattered that Jay and Bonnie were going to be stepping, figuratively, into harm's way, either. Jake had all but told Finn that he wasn't going.
Finn turned to his kids. "I'm ready, daddy," Bonnie murmured. She didn't sound ready. She sounded terrified. Still, it was clear that Bonnie Mertens was determined. "Let's get this done," Jay announced. Far from being terrified or determined, Finn found a hint of something worrying in his boy's attitude. Turning to his son, Finn said, "be careful, Jay. I lost my son once..." Jay flushed and glanced away.
Bonnie strolled up to a trio of tanks, staked out just at the edge of the foreboding woods. One of the operators left his mates and came over to her. The pillow-person declared, "the way this is going to work, is that when I signal you, you've got about twenty or thirty seconds to prepare. You'll find yourself in a bounded world... You won't be able to drive away. If you try... I can't guarantee your safety, and you'd just be making life more difficult for me. I'll place you in close to the enemy machine. He'll be right in front of you... pinned... You'll have maybe a couple of minutes or so to do as much damage as you can."
Grimly, the soldier nodded. His companion spoke up, "could milady perhaps put the enemy machine in the center of the firing cone... like this..." He bent and drew on the ground. Bonnie frowned a moment. Then, after thinking about it, she offered, "yes... Yes I can." The soldiers went back and had a hasty conference before repositioning their vehicles. As they worked, foot soldiers moved in close behind each machine. They had heard the pretty girl's words about not straying too far, but nobody was sure just how far 'too far' was.
Trouble came to the world of the would be warlord, Tatsuo Nagumo, as he was down on the docks overseeing the effort to move his army's equipment onto transport ships for the evacuation to their redoubt. It had taken hours of cajoling for him to see it, but the reality had dawned on him in the wee hours of the morning. Kaito was right. The dream would die here if he fell to Finn the Human in this place.
He'd ordered the army to begin steps for the evacuation late in the night, and they'd been at it for more than eight hours already. First to go were the spare parts and weapons. They'd moved on from there to the technical equipment and computers, with plans to get the food supplies moved next. Unfortunately, it appeared that they were now out of time. Sounds of gunfire and the concussive blasts of exploding cannon-shells announced that the enemy attack had already begun.
Reaching up to his armored breastplate, Tatsuo thumbed the communication device, shouting, "Kaito! Kaito, what's happening?" His lieutenant responded immediately. "Not sure, Lord," he replied. "I received a message stating that three war-machines materialized in front of the west castle. I'm trying to get an answer from our soldiers now." Tatsuo could hear him running, and he could hear the crash of explosions, causing his blood to run cold in his veins.
He wanted to fight. He wanted to go into glorious battle with Finn the Human. He wanted to test the man himself. At the same time, the matter was too close, and he had no idea what it was that his foe was doing. He had important things he had to gather up. They were leverage against the King of Ooo. Turning to one of his subordinates, he said, "get the ships underway. I want them out of the harbor. Have them stand off at ten miles distance. I'll be joining you shortly." With that, Tatsuo Nagumo ran out into the town. He had to gather up his most precious assets.
On the far side of town, Kaito Maeda shouted for calm, as he tried to understand what was happening. The unit that had been guarding the southwest tower was gone. All he could see was a strange haze. Their electronic surveillance systems were going haywire, and his troops were terrified. He was considering piloting his own machine into whatever the fog was that had sprung up around his soldier, when the fog suddenly disappeared, revealing... a shattered machine savaged by gunfire.
Back on the far side of the field, Bonnie Mertens blew out a breath. That had been a little terrifying! It was every bit as difficult as it had been the first time she'd done this, and she'd found herself expanding the bubble much larger than she might have otherwise to protect her dad's soldiers. Now, those men cheered, and several of them rushed forward to slap her on the back or hug her.
Of course, they still had more machines to go. When the men had calmed down once more, the half-breed announced, "back to your places, everyone. We've still got work to do." The soldiers immediately moved back to their positions. Bonnie calmed herself, finding her center. And then, reaching out across space and time, she brought them to their foes.
The war-machine that was their target was no better prepared than the previous fellow. He did the same thing they all seemed to do. He fired his rockets and tried to get away, only to find that no matter how hard he hammered the rockets, there was no escape. The tanks were almost perfectly ranged in, and they laid into the war-machine. At the same time, the soldiers leveled their dart-guns at the stalks and antenna clusters, aiming to blind the pilot. Bonnie was calmer this time. She'd done this enough times, she had some idea what to expect. As the pilot tried to fly away, she matched his movements, keeping him there in the center of the bubble as her companions shredded his machine. And then, it was over once more, with her releasing the power and returning them all to Ooo.
Kaito Maeda goggled in shock as yet another machine met its demise. Just as before, there was nothing left but a dazed man climbing out of the wreckage of his vehicle. It was only minutes later that the whole thing began again. Frantically shouting into his radio-link, the stunned soldier commanded the other machines on the fort to fire into the strange shimmering haze. The four remaining war-machines immediately began to do just that, unloading on the strange phenomenon with everything they had. Much to Kaito's horror, those blasts of spite went through the strange shimmer and out the other side as if it wasn't even there.
Down in the town, Tatsuo Nagumo had to contend with the terrified populace, who were rushing away from the north end of the town. The locals had no stomach for war–one more reason not to make this the place he made his stand. They were fleeing the sound of battle in a panic, and some looked as though they'd go swimming when they reached the harbor. He needed to get out of here fast.
He'd kept his prizes in separate places–just in case. He feared the treachery that had defeated his army at Sonbong. Now, that appeared to have been an unwise decision. He feared the battle was reaching its climax, and he was both unable to affect the outcome and in danger of losing his most vital assets. One or the other, he decided. He could only have one of his prizes. He had to decide which mattered most.
On the eastern side of the defensive front, a shimmering haze gave way to the sight of one of the war-machines catastrophically burned. The blistered paint flaked away to reveal charred metal underneath, and the pilot inside was almost certainly burned or broiled to death in his own body fluids. Every wire and hose was gone, as if the thing had been roasted in a flaming pit of lava. One of the terrified pilots toggled the ejector seat, leaving his machine behind, even as the man next to him was snatched away into that strange netherworld.
Kaito knew he was losing the defensive line. He'd expected to be defeated here. The trouble was that he'd expected the defeat to come by stealth and treachery from within the town or from a direction they couldn't defend. He'd never have imagined something like what he was seeing now. Thinking quickly, the soldier rushed to where he'd left his own machine, arriving just as another wreck was returned to Ooo, burned and charred.
Rushing through the checklist, even as his frightened men shouted in terror and panic, the hapless officer launched into the sky, angling for the shimmering cloud that had just engulfed the last machine on the west bastion. His instruments immediately went haywire, the gyro-stabilization system spinning wildly so that he very nearly began to tumble. The cameras went white with static, and he found himself toggling open the viewport only to find himself gazing out on an expanse of hazy gray emptiness.
The clock went mad, and the computers began to lock up, one by one. As the last of the control computers shutdown, the machine began to tumble, end over end. Kaito found himself praying to his ancestors for salvation. This was nothing like what he'd expected. This was hardly the warrior's fate he'd hoped for.
Back at the edge of the forest, Bonnie Mertens released her hold on Bonnie World, leaving one last smoking ruin of a war-machine atop the bastion at the edge of Kun-Som. "It's over, daddy," she said. "The last of the machines is down." As she reported that news, Jay came strolling over from the other end of the field. "The machines in the east are neutralized, dad," he announced. "What's next?"
Finn turned to General Ultrich. "Please go and liberate my citizens from this so-called warlord, General Ultrich," said the King. "At once, sire," the general responded. Spinning on his heel, he stepped off to get the troops in motion. When he'd gone, Bonnie rushed up and hugged her daddy, giving vent to a burst of emotion as she cried on his shoulder. The King of Ooo hugged his eldest daughter, stroking her long blonde locks gently, as he whispered words of thanks.
It was more than an hour later that the general reported that it was safe for the King to come into the town. Finn came riding through the gates in the back of an army truck, feeling almost as though he were slinking in rather than striding in like a conqueror. Jake had made it clear that this was the only way he was going, though.
The town of Kun-Som was quiet and still. There were few people on the streets, and Finn was delighted to see that, beyond the ancient forts that defended the town's approaches, there was very little destruction. Weaving their way through the town, they could see signs of Nagumo's hasty departure. There were crates filled with bits and bobs, containers of food that had been left behind, and even one war-machine that was partially disassembled as if they'd been in the process of either repairing it or moving it onto a ship for transport.
Arriving down on the town's central square, Finn waited only long enough for the guards and soldiers to announce that the area was secure before hopping down–earning a baleful glare from his bodyguard/girlfriend. Jake Junior was at his side the minute his feet touched the pavement. She was back in hiking boots now and wearing a light jacket over the sexy blue dress.
"Sire," General Ultrich greeted him. "The enemy has fled. He took ship from the harbor in the middle of the battle. The locals tell me they started frantically loading ships last night." "Damn," Finn muttered. He'd hoped to have cost that ass-hat more. He'd hoped that Nagumo's pride wouldn't let him flee again. "There's one other thing," Ultrich announced. His tone told Finn that something was going to be a bit of a doozy. "Ok," Finn said "Let's see it."
'It' turned out to be a face that he'd feared he would never see again. At the general's command, his troops brought a woman out of the crowd. She was dressed in an ugly light green jumpsuit, looking haggard and worn. Her eyes were haunted, and Finn feared she'd been abused. His feet were in motion almost before Bonnie could register that this woman was someone important. "Sakura," Finn cried, as he embraced the fallen princess. "Finn," she burbled, as she began to cry.
Nagumo flees to fight another day, leaving his most loyal soldier on the battlefield. Fionna braves the wilds with Maja. And Gordon Wells stirs up trouble in the former Beauty Kingdom. Wonder what Princess Beautiful is going to do about THIS development?
And, of course, Sakura returns to the fold. Figured you all deserved a bit of a payoff for sticking with the story this long. :) More twists and turns to come, of course.