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Chapter I
Kal-El looked again inside the new ship, it was big enough for him. There was a lone chair in the middle, build to carry his body comfortably for the long journey ahead. Tomorrow… He remembered the simulation of the travel, the lessons about avoiding meteors and mechanical problems along the way. The crystals had the needed information, a perfect computer with its own artificial intelligence.
Jor-El came behind him to touch his shoulder sympathetically, wishing his son had a smile instead of a deep frown on his face. He took off the cape he used and folded it neatly to give to the young man.
"It's our new beginning, Kal-El. Our people decided to rejoin other galaxies, to show our advanced technology and help the planets achieve the peace we now have." Jor-El smiled in a mist of happiness and sadness. Krypton should fight its xenophobic acts, but this progress should not cost his son. "I chose Earth for you, my son. This fragile planet needs a good leader to guide nations through a dark moment. So many wars consumed the people, the last one destroyed millions."
"Twelve years ago…" Zor-El, Jor-El's brother, said, never looking too far away from his computer. "Darkseid almost won. If not for the internal war started on Apokolips while the Dark Lord was away, his parademons would have destroyed Earth."
"So… He did not win, father," Kal-El glared his uncle for awhile, then turned to his father. "Darkseid is not a threat to Earth anymore. He lost."
"Does it matter he lost? Many people lost also, but their lives instead of a war." Jor-El touched one particular crystal to close the ship for the night. Tomorrow he would make the last adjusts. "Darkseid is dead now, finally his kingdom of wrath is over. But it doesn't mean the planets are safe. Zciaran took the place of the God and did not continue to expand his realm… for now. In time, he will," Jor-El said somberly, not sure about the plans of the new Lord. "Earth still tries to forget the destruction… There are persistent people in there, son. They have strong will, a good instinct of survival. They welcome all the help."
"Are they tolerant? I may look like them, but, as you predicted, my body will be different under a yellow sun. Do you think they deal well with super powered aliens? Because that's what I will be before their eyes." Kal-El turned to look through the glass wall, confused still, the city below was beautiful but drew so little emotion from him. The crystals with which his planet was made of gave Krypton a cold aspect, increased by the rational people that walked amongst him. "I don't fear humans, father. I'm curious about them. But how do I know about their attitude towards me?"
"You don't, son." Lara entered the room with a reassuring smile. "Perhaps you'll understand the moment you land. Perhaps days or years later." She closed the gap between them and touched his face. "You'll do well, Kal-El. And you have us to guide you through doubts and mistakes, don't forget."
"I'm sure of that, mother. Thank you."
"Tomorrow at this time you will be far from Krypton, but we're still close to you, Kal-El." Jor-El gave him half dozen cylindrical crystals as a gift to his bravery for facing the mission imposed by the council. "A friend awaits you. Someone like us, alien as you said earlier. J'onn J'onnz is his name. A young Martian who adopted Earth as home after the annihilation of his people."
Kal-El stood silent before his parents. Unlike the Martian, he could still come back home, he could embrace his mother and talk to his father whenever he wanted. He felt bad now for this J'onn J'onnz. With a nod he took the crystals and protected it with his father's red cape.
"Fear not, Kal-El!" Zor-El exclaimed from his chair, looking his nephew with pride. "Had I the age, I'd send myself for this experience. Look at this opportunity, you'll brave a new world after so many years of our enclosure."
"Yeah. I'll be fine." At the age of seventeen, sometimes, he felt uncomfortable with his appearance and showed only a small timid smile. Kal-El had an average high compared to his people, but his broad shoulders meant tough exercises in the past years. He, along with five other younger, was prepared for a mission on another galaxy. Jor-El's son won the tournament, proving himself physically and intellectually. "Maybe my good looks will charm them all." He joked before leaving the laboratory.
The smile disappeared right after the door closed behind him.
"I hope."
She saw natural light for the first time in eight weeks and five days.
She counted.
Slowly going up the stairs, the cool air started to surround her, causing a chill to run up her spine. The strange sensation seemed to last all the way to the outside, through the gates and stairs of the underworld, through cages and smelly prisoners. It worsened every time a yell reached her, anguished shrieks caused by hunger, thirst or, most of the time, by the inflicted pain on the prisoners' bodies.
Long ago the repugnant view of decomposing limbs and open wounds with moving beings stopped affecting her stomach.
For seven years she lived in this hell that could be even worse than Apokolips. Physical torture was one of the methods used on children; she had no scar to prove, because somehow her healing ability was very good. But the psychological abuse branded her deep inside, bringing to the surface an emotionless girl who fought every hour for survival, like the other planets' lowly kids.
She was meant to slavery like her mother. For her lifetime she was bound to work on the underground, serving the Lord and his bunch of ass-kisser followers. Usually, for being quite talented to find a good fight in the low chambers, she would be sent to the outside to receive proper punishment. Beatings and humiliations were the most frequent. Sometimes the guards voted between them to choose the one who would use her as his pleasure doll, then, when it was over, she was transformed in a punching bag. Today would be no different, she thought bitterly.
Only that this time she was taken to the arena.
The crowd was already waiting for her. One guard opened the gate while the other threw her on the ground and left, locking her closer exit. The bleachers were full of people, the True People of the new planet, as they claimed themselves to be. Malicious eyes pierced her small body as if searching for the place from where the blood would come out first.
She looked down at her ragged dress, self-conscious, only to find a few more holes on the dirty garment. Her skin was even darker than the cloth. The underworld soil was like mud, but with something slippery mixed, like the oil used to heat the kettles. It was impossible to keep herself clean if even the water was filthy. Maybe once in a bimester, the Lord would send crystalline water to bathe the women and children; the men would use the water later, when it was already foul, but better than the other in the pipes.
A gush of wind reached her face all of a sudden. It had an unpleasant flower scent, something common in this planet, leaving her lightheaded because of such acute fragrance. The unexpected slap across the face was enough to wake her up for the oncoming battle that she'd have to fight.
"Whoever was taken unknowingly to the arena will fight till death," said the rumor downstairs.
"Hello, Rubbi." She recognized the voice as the one belonged to the despising leader of the infant army. Arrhya was a fierce and cruel young Fury trainee who liked to use the children from below, the ones she could kill without worries. "It's been a while."
A graceful kick landed on the younger's chin, drawing blood of her mouth, followed by one left hook strong enough to send her flying above the ground. Before she could regain her breath, Arrhya grabbed her short hair in a vice grip, shoving her head on the stony wall beside them.
The crowd roared in thirst for blood.
"You're for their fun today, Rubbish," Arrhya said between her smiles and enthusiastic screams coming from the crowd. "People got tired of skillful warriors on the arena. Apparently, there wasn't too much blood to satisfy them."
Arrhya gave the girl some time to get up.
"This is meant to be a show, Rubbish. Don't make me cut it short because of your lack of ability. If not you, there are dozens of kids for me to slaughter."
Without a tinge of beauty on her moves, the underworld girl tried a blind punch to the other's face. The first achieved its goal by surprise, but the following lost strength when Arrhya, more than fast, gripped her right forearm and threw her over one shoulder very precisely, as taught by the best warriors of the kingdom. Arrhya was to be one of the reformulated Furies after the Lord destroyed Apokolips from inside and took Darkseid's elite guard to his side to train warriors, intending to form an army led by the head of his most skilled guard of seven.
Rubbi took the opportunity to give a low kick and run from anymore attacks for the moment. She fidgeted with the thin bracelets around her wrists, trying uselessly to take them off. She needed them off now. Using both today was not a good idea.
"Since when did you become a coward, Rubbi? Last time we met, you're eager to pound my head into the nearest wall."
"Last time we met, you had me chained to a wall," she spit the words angrily. "Me wanting your head blew comes from an old dream I had. Worthless brat."
Arrhya responded to her misbehavior with a motion of both hands that aimed for the head, giving the girl's ears a ringing echoing sound, and proceeded to twist her left arm.
The lowly's scream silenced the crowd when Arrhya almost took her arm out of its right place on the shoulder.
"Yield, Rubbi, yield!" The amused scream echoed through the foggy darkness, muffled shortly by the thick atmosphere. "Say it, Rubbish! Oh, sorry, you can't. You too busy kissin' the floor."
The blond young adult stomped on one leg of the girl and pulled the other as if trying to separate it from her body just like she did with the arm. Then kicked her ribs twice until the cracking sound could be heard by the sharp ears of the Lord. Arrhya wanted his attention solemnly on her fight style, her winning side of every battle, since not one useless being bested her on the dirty soil of Haecatombè. She grinned when laughter filled the crowd upon seeing the slave-to-be girl get up with a broken leg and a dislocated arm ready to fight again.
"As you wish, Rubbi," Creating a whip with her bare fingers, she maneuvered it with elegance never, consciously, aiming for the blue eyed girl, but the earth beneath her, lifting dust and small stones controlled telepathically to hit the lowly undignified child. "I'll kill ya!"
Twice the whip caught her arms. Thrice the stones found a way to reach her breastplate. Counting silently, the raven haired twelve years old stood motionless before the amused people who came to see her blood sprawled around the arena. She wanted to run out of there, scared by some faces, but didn't allow such coward act. Weakness was not on her underworld training. Killing was. For the Lord's will.
"Please the Lord and you might serve his army on the outside," her mother ordered her to behave. Somehow, being a part of the worst section of the army was a glory to those of the underworld. An important privilege.
Her mother…
She remembered how severe was the woman who raised her. Diana, as she called her on the good days, didn't know how that woman found her, but wished she never did. Granny Goodness started training her to be a warrior of Apokolips before the invasion, she was too young to do that sort of thing, but there wasn't a negative answer to Granny's wills. The attack put the old woman on her place: jail, but Diana had to stay underground with her. Unfortunately.
Remembering the hell underneath, she knew she had to fight. Not for the Lord. Not for her mother. For herself. For some freedom.
Both hands in fists, she moved swiftly to attack the ground. She repeated the action. Then again, causing a minor quake in it. The fifth punch split the floor and the old bracelets around her wrists. She sighed relieved.
The raw power took her battered body to the knees and the dizziness impeded her to lift her head. She felt the pain fade gradually. Her fingers could move again and the numbness on the fractured limbs started to disappear.
Arrhya used the moment to whip Rubbi forcefully, but backed away when she heard only the sound of marble being hit by a soft rope. She noticed the oddity, but shrugged. One kick would have to do, she thought evilly, recoiling the whip.
"You yield, Arrhya." Above a whisper she said once and would not repeat herself. The foot stopped midair in front of her face.
"Come again?!"
In a blink, the younger got up and held Arrhya's neck, choking her slowly, savoring the moment she would unleash whatever was blocked by those old broken cuffs. She didn't let her breathe before shoving her on the barricade that limited the arena, right under the Lord's dais. Punch after punch, the child drew blood from the other, choosing the right places to leave her conscious, well aware of the little revenge.
"I won't kill you for now," Rubbi said aloud. "Dead you won't obey me when I rise as your commander."
"You're a lowly, Rubbish, found in the garbage of the low world." Arrhya said, harsh. "Weak as those earthlings and dirty as the ones who raised you under Darkseid's orders. Be grateful the Lord accepted you here even with such disgraces that you represent. Human trash."
"I'll show you the human."
Arrhya saw her enemy's eyes brighten with a blue and strange light, making her own close to not show the sudden fear in them. Rubbi held her neck loosely and hovered above the ground, initially a few inches, but, not long after, she had Arrhya seeing her people as ants miles below.
"I changed my mind, Arrhya... You will fall, daughter of the Lord."
The cold glare was the last thing Arrhya saw before the fall that left every single bone in her body broken in tiny pieces. Rubbi just watched the scene from the arena, unmoved by the turn of the tables.
Death was part of her world and she was part of Haecatombè now.
The guards came after her for the sake of their princess, Arrhya. Rubbi beat them with one bare hand anyway she could, using a found sword in the other to pierce the men's bodies near what they called heart. She didn't have experience in warrior like fights, the short time in Apokolips was not enough to learn the right way to draw a weapon or how to move correctly around the enemy. Her attacks aimed for the bodies randomly, making gruesome and messy gashes, while escaping from the tips of swords and punches and kicks.
Without her notice, one by one the guards fell and she came to a stop when realized no one was moving towards her. She stood on the arena, alone.
Not the other guards or the silent crowd had the guts to look into her freezing eyes nor the courage to fight her after the quick massacre with the fifteen people.
Rubbi looked around for the first time after she subdued the blind rage that consumed her body and mind. The stillness weighted the air as if everyone mourned for the dead. A long minute passed without noise. She didn't know if it was a disapproving glare she received or a fearful one.
She didn't care.
This was the opportunity to leave the hell.
The Lord would only decide if dead or alive.
Her body went cold when a big hand held her recently healed head without her even noticing he was close, his strength barely smashing her bones, and whispered for her small ears in the language of Apokolips. She understood every word wide eyed, memorizing all threats and promises for her future. The traitor of Apokolips, who reached the Dark Lord cautiously and took him down, inherited the crown of the most feared God by using the deceased's army to attack the planets around. But the years made him lose power with his lack of skillful warriors and now he saw in her the possibility to change his predicament.
Once, she thought that being a slave could be the worse of the fates, but if analyzed, nothing compared to becoming a personal killing machine as the Lord ordered for only her to hear. The pressure on her head vanished before she could mutter a word.
She realized he wanted none.
"Above my warriors," the Lord rose to his full high, breaking the curious silence, ignoring his own child's death and admiring his newfound conquer, "you will rise as their leader when the age comes to you. For now, you ascend as my protégée. Both if shown more of this mighty power hidden beneath such unthinkable façade."
Rubbi looked straight into his face, stunned, and then saw the gates being opened. The coliseum had five of them that led to the subterranean jail from where only one hundred prisoners came through, seeing the dark light of the outside for the first time since imprisonment.
His last whispered words reverberated and the pain on her consciousness just amplified the meaning behind them.
Those hundred people looked at her with knowing eyes, causing a lump to form on her throat. For the first time in years, she assumed to herself that she was only a child. One who now wanted to curl into a ball and cry, then scream at the Lord for obliging her to commit such despising act. The guilt for killing a hundred of her own people would consume her insides forever. The thought of it almost brought her to her knees, but she couldn't waver in front of the Lord. Never where he could see.
Killing Arrhya was a revenge for all the times she was spanked and humiliated. But killing innocents… She swallowed dryly and focused on her future out of the underworld with only the Lord by her side.
"Show me, my precious Ruby. Show me!"
Diana started to move towards the closer woman.
By the end, the reddish sky envied the bloodied ground for its shiny dye. The deep red color of the other world's mineral became her signature. It was too much alike the blood that would never come off of her hands. And his words impregnated like the blood, they would never leave her head.
Fight.
Win.
Kill.
Conquer!