Chapter 10 - Tartarus
Philippus's soldiers beat back three waves of Shakanar hordes in overwhelming numbers. With each attack, Aysha Napolipolita-Daitokuji and Deesha Dakina Azawa were in the thick of it.
Cuts and slashes bled from both participants in the close-quartered battle. Though painful, the wounds were not fatal. The scars they would leave would augment those the Cygnan soldiers had had received over the years fighting for Queen and Empire. They would earn these particular wounds, however, in defense of their friends and the small blue world both now called home.
Aysha had just finished off another Shakanar with her amazonium-edged battle ax when she heard a cry of pain. She rounded quickly in time to see Deesha fall. In a rage, she cut and slashed her way through her enemies to be at her side.
By the time she reached Dee, her garments and weapon were covered with gore from those Shakanar who had tried to stop her. She then cut her way through the redbacks who circled the wounded ex-Shakanar, eager to take her into custody for further study. Deesha had been shot in the leg. Holding her side piece with one hand to keep the Skakanar at bay. Suddenly, an incendiary beam from the Revenge struck nearby, and the Shakanar dashed off in case more were coming. During this very brief hiatus, the former Egota captain dragged Deesha behind a boulder, praying to Mother Cybele that no one the Shakanar Sisterhood had seen them.
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The quartet now huddled close to the ground, eyes searching all directions for hidden foes. The escape pod lay empty three hundred yards behind them.
Emulating her beloved white tigers, Master Sergeant Buyabah sniffed the air for any hint of Shakanar.
"Well?" the Cygnan queen whispered.
"So far, nothing."
"Your Clemency?" asked Queen Zazen'lda.
"Nothing on our right, Your Majesty," said Council Mother Sempra Vigilantia, her half-gold and half-silver hair ruffled by the breeze that did not carry the sounds of battle – at least not yet.
"Buyabah, where is our next landmark?"
"Up ahead and slightly to your left, Your Highness. There is a small grove of trees a hundred yards away, some of them smoldering from Shakanar heavy arms fire. I noticed the carbon scoring on their trunks."
"Hardly nature lovers, them. Or lovers of anything else in the Cosmos, except maybe themselves," Zazen'lda replied. "Master Sergeant! Lead the way!"
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Finally, this particular skirmish among the Shakanar and the Amazons ended.
Dead Shakanar – whose last thought on Planet Earth was how a group of women using bows and arrows managed to pierce their bioarmor – stained the grass. Of the members of this company, only one had managed to escape.
Queen Hippolyta picked up a dying trooper by her blood-red armor. "Why?" she demanded.
"For the treasure," the soldier replied. "For That Which Was Lost. The treasure of daughters long denied us."
Hippolyta threw down the soldier in disgust. "How many daughters have I lost today? Are you satisfied, Ares, O heartless God of War? I hope you're pleased that all of this slaughter was to allow those monsters to breed. I wonder, my Lord of War, if it keeps the gate of Tartarus closed, it might be an accomplishment worth all of these lives."
She lifted her face toward the sky and let the wind brush her cheeks. "O Lord Zeus – give me justice against the Lord of Battles!" She turned to issue orders to her companions and stopped when she saw Cassandra kneeling on the ground, holding Helena in her arms.
Helena of the sweet voice – the best singer and lute player among the Amazons – had been run through the back and stabbed in the right lung. She was drowning in her own blood and there was nothing anyone could do for her. Cassandra held the poor woman in her arms, wiping the foaming blood away from Helena's lips and begged her not to leave her. Hippolyta knew that it was already too late, as the wounded woman's skin had that grayish tint she'd often seen in the faces of the dying.
"Promise me that you won't leave me," Cassandra begged.
"That's one promise I cannot keep, my love," she managed to say before being silenced by another coughing fit.
I don't think I want to go on without you," Cassandra moaned.
Helena raised her bloody hand and tenderly touched her cheek. "You must go on, just as I must go on to join our Sisters." With a final cough and a small shudder, Helena joined them in the Elysian Fields.
Tenderly, Hippolyta placed her hand on Cassandra's shoulder. Before she could say a word, she pushed the hand away. Still holding Helena's body in her arms, she snarled, "Haven't you had enough blood? Do we all have to die to satisfy you?"
Understanding the reason behind her bitterness, the Amazon Queen ignored the insult. "What about you, Cassandra? Do you wish to take your revenge on me for leading your love to her death, or on the invaders who killed her? Better to avenge her death on Ares, who feasts on sorrow and agony like your own. Will you permit her life and her death to have no meaning?"
Cassandra picked up her sword and bent at her Queen's feet, placing the razor-sharp point to her own throat and offered the hilt to her ruler. "I have insulted my Queen," she said, "and I am ready to accept her just punishment!"
"That blow to your head must have rattled your brains, Cassandra. I heard no insult, nor do I remember any." Hippolyta helped her to her feet, adding, "We have much to do, and I need your help to do it." Quickly examining the ancient redwood trunk, bound with iron forged by Hephaestus himself, she saw that it was still intact. However, explosions, gunfire, and the best efforts of Shakanar hands had broken the amazonium brace on its far end.
"Your orders, my Queen?"
"We must repair the Gates of Hell. You must find my daughter and granddaughter and bring them both here to me. Together, we will repair the damage and protect our home and the world from the evil that lies behind that door!"
"Your Majesty! Even you, with all your strength, cannot hold back the hordes of demons who seek the sunlight!"
The Amazon Queen replied, "I can hold it long enough, I pray, until you return with help!"
"And your son-in-law, my Queen?"
"My wayward child's mate has no business meddling in Amazon affairs – " Hippolyta suddenly stopped her rant against the absent Man of Steel, relenting. " - yes, Cassandra. He would be of great help to us all!"
Cassandra bowed and began to take her leave. Hippolyta then shouted, "And don't get yourself killed until you find Diana and A-ko!"
Standing back up, Hippolyta heard the first banging on the massive door. A look of fear crossed her face. Turning once again to the fallen Amazon, she said, "You were a fine warrior, Helena – a true Amazon and the finest singer I have ever heard." She watched the door to Tartarus shudder once more. "If help doesn't arrive on time, it will be a comfort to know that I will soon be hearing your sweet voice once again."
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"It's still bleeding!" Deesha gasped, staring in wonder at the wound in her leg. "It's – not – stopping!"
"Um, yes, Dee. It is bleeding all right," Napolipolita-Daitokuji replied. "I wish it weren't. Here, let me try to wrap you up before those thugs figure out where we went!"
"They're – gone, Aysha! They're really gone!"
It was then that Aysha understood her friend's meaning. For the first time, Deesha had seen actual proof that the Shakanar nano-bots infesting her body since age fourteen were truly gone.
With the sight of her own life's blood still running down her leg, Dee was finally able to convince herself that a more normal life could be hers. Perhaps the most important thing of all was that she finally had reason to believe that the gift of children might yet be in store for her.
But first, she and her friend Aysha had to survive the Shakanar attack that was bound to come, and soon.
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"Captain Knossos! We've stopped our trajectory to the Revenge!" shouted the helmswoman of Her Majesty's Delos-class ship, the Berserk Souffle.
"Will someone tell me what's going on?" cried Princess E-ko, gritting her teeth and clenching her fists.
"Princess, we've just been turned away from our target within the past few seconds!"
"What the Avernus are you talking about?" E-ko screeched. "Turn us back around toward the Revenge! Ramming speed!"
"I'm sorry, Your Highness," said the helmswoman. "My controls are unresponsive."
Knossos ran to her station and checked the displays for herself. "She's right, Your Highness. Helm is not responding. It seems we have another complication as well – an intruder is on board!"
"What?" E-ko sputtered. "How could anyone board?"
"Through the empty life-pod stations, Princess," Captain Knossos responded. "Although that makes no sense to me."
The helmswoman reported, "Intruder now in the corridor leading to the command bridge!"
E-ko barked a series of orders. "Seal armored doors! Prepare to repel boarders!"
There was a strange and eerie silence on the command bridge as they waited for whatever was outside. Suddenly, there was what could only be called a knock on the other side of the bridge door. E-ko drew her sword, Dragon-Fang, and raised it noiselessly.
The bridge crew looked at one another, bewildered. It was Princess E-ko who finally broke the silence. "What do you know? A polite Shakanar, and one with manners, too!"
A loud round of laughter broke the tension in the room. Then all waited for the attack to begin.
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The older girls were busy guarding the door that led out into the corridor. Aki kept an eye on both the door and the group of younger children who guarded the Shakanar warrior. Shiiko and Mitsuko guarded the big Shakanar with a pulse rifle they hardly knew how to use. Nearby stood their little brother Kir and the Kent children.
The shock trooper was now fully awake and sitting up, but still tightly bound. She shook her shaggy violet head and snarled, showing her large white teeth. She then looked at little Kir and said in Cygnan, "What are you looking at, you half-breed little freak?"
Small Kir had yet to fully grasp the Leptonian language, let alone its less than polite terms, but he knew full well the tone if not the literal translation of the insult to himself and his mama.
Fortunately, his two big sisters, the eldest still gripping the pulse rifle for all she was worth, were fluent in their mother's home language and – because they had been around when the former Captain had stepped on a small toy barefooted or smeared her eyeliner – knew its insults and swear words.
"Call my baby brother that again and I'll knock those teeth down your throat," Shiiko growled.
"And then I'll kick you in your belly for mumbling," added Mitsuko, doing her best Bogart imitation (her daddy loved film noir movies).
"Why are you so mean?" little Jon asked their prisoner as he inched closer.
"Why have you been cursed to have been born a male?" she snarled in response.
Lois laughed at her twin brother and said, "Nasty big lobster lady, you're right about one thing – boys are big pains!"
"And girls have big cooties!" Jon fired back, blowing her a raspberry.
Frustrated and ashamed at being taken captive by a pack of half-breeds and children, Ratha Kodene growled, "Get away from me, you kakamatandis!
At that, the children in the room set up a howl of laughter – every one of them, save the Kent youngsters, knew what that particular Cygnan swear meant. Jon - still wearing his innocence like a garment – then asked her, "Are you mean because you're so big? How did you get so big, anyway?"
Kodene snarled once more at the little boy. "I am Shakanar, picked by the Mother of All, trained since girlhood to defend the Leptonian Empire, obedient to my leaders, and loyal to my Sisters and not to that mincing clown currently on the Throne. We are the last hope of true Cygnans and the rightful rulers of their Empire! We are here on this planet – primitive mud ball that it is – to seize once again That Which Was Lost."
"Who lost what?" Akana sneered, knowing what was coming.
"Our ability to have daughters of our own, you raldash scum," the soldier snapped.
"And who exactly would help you great hulking cows accomplish that?" Aki grinned. Biko cracked up, knowing what was coming. "No self-respecting male would touch any one of you with a barge pole. It's nothing but injections for you, I fear!"
A chorus of "eeeewwwww"s filled the air as Jon – still only four – failed to understand exactly What Was Lost and so asked her again. "What did you lose, big lobster lady?"
"The directions to the beauty parlor," Biko added, which led to another round of youthful laughter.
"Shut up, all of you! Who are these vile children, and why are they torturing me?" said Ratha Kodene. "Surely the Mother would not inflict such whelps on me!"
Shiiko gestured at the Kent children. "I'm surprised you don't recognize them."
"Why should I know these cockeyed uglies?" Kodene answered.
"I see you know our baby brother already," Mitsuko snapped. She then pointed toward the Kent twins. "Their daddy is the one who took away your great crystal dome at the headquarters of your dried-up Council of Sisters."
"That was an illusion! That never happened!"
"Like fun it was," Biko added from the other room. "I was there, you bloated mess. I have even seen recent images from space showing that big round thing lying all by itself in the Mur Sejanus desert. None of you holy-roller goofballs can figure out how to put it back!"
Mitsuko wasn't done. "And – " she continued with a sly grin not unlike her mother's – "their mother is the woman whom you losers call The Demon!"
At the mention of The Demon, Kodene looked around to make sure the Terror of the Shakanar wasn't just around the corner to avenge the Shakanar's insults to her babies.
"Any why are you so big, again?" said Lois. "You don't answer our questions and if I were you, I would start quick-smart before I get real mad."
"As if a tiny child could wreak damage upon a member of the Shakanar Sisterhood!" scoffed Ratha Kodene. "The answer is – it was a blessing from the Great Mother!"
"And enough growth hormones and steroids to kill a tanga," Shiiko replied, referencing a large mammal her mother had mentioned that lived in the Cygnan lands of the Adrymachidae Tribe.
Little Lois pressed on. "Why can't you be nice? Aunt Barda is almost as big as you are, and Mama says she is a great and brave warrior. She's always nice to us!"
"And pretty, too!" her brother interrupted.
"And always bakes us cookies," Lois added.
"And they're even better than Daddy's!" Jon cried excitedly. He – like many males of his age – thought too much with his stomach.
The big Shakanar sighed, now realizing she wasn't going anywhere and neither were these blasted children. "Who is this Barda person?"
"Big Barda is the wife of Mr. Free. They have eight children and some of them spend the summer with us on the farm!"
Ratha Kodene began to laugh. "So The Demon and her whelps dig in the dirt like grubs. Wait until I tell my Sisters the news!" She laughed and laughed until she rolled backwards onto the floor. In a flash and unobserved, she snatched up one of the sharp broken shards of the vase Biko had shied at her shaggy head.
"Who says you'll live long enough to spread the word?" Aki said grimly.
The big Shakanar simply smiled and went back to her surreptitious sawing away at the bonds that held her.
Aki called to her two younger half-sisters, "Hey, you two! Get over here! I think trouble is on the way!"
Immediately after the two sisters left, Ratha Kodene began sawing away at her bonds in earnest.