Chapter 6: Ending a legacy
From the romantic seaside view of Catsablanca to the majestic seaside view of the Anatolia, Earl's plane soar through the sky like Horus and saw that the various hills and rocky mountain sides gave off the sense of Hellenic beauty unmatched anywhere else on the planet. Angie sat behind the cockpit looking out of the window for signs of Anubis's rally point. So far, nothing has come into her sight yet, "Nothing yet Earl, keep flying but if we have to, land the bird at some place safe. Maybe a local airstrip." Said Angie as she watched the ground below.
While they were in the air, on the ground Anubis himself was pacing back and forth by the ruins of the Temple of Artemis, he glanced at the watch on his wrist seeing that it was now 15:00 hours and that his companions were still nowhere to be found. "Don't be sssso troubled by the lack of mortalssssss presssssence Anubissssss. Perhapsssss they are well on their waysssss right now." Said Kukulkan as he fluttered in front of Anubis, the frown of the Jackal deity grew more and more as he try to keep his mind focus and tranquil.
"Kukulkan, forgive my trouble but I have reasons to be concerned. You should fly up and guide them in but don't crash their plane in the process with your winds." The jackal deity sighed out as he watched Kukulkan flew up into the air and fly over towards the direction of Earl's plane. From his cockpit, the wolf pilot can see that his radar began to pick up the signature of an UFO heading towards him from the Northeast direction.
Kukulkan's reading appeared as a simple green dot on a circular radar instrument on Earl's right. The green dot occasionally blipped up on the radar and fade away, but for each time the dot was visible it was definitely approaching Earl's plane. A bit too close for comfort for him since he grabbed the control wheel by both joysticks much tighter than before. "Something just entered out airspace guys. Gettin' closer too. Gettin' closer faster." Earl said right as he squinted his eyes to the radar screen. "Ehhh. Getting' closer faster." Earl said as he lifted his body back up. He pinched his microphone on the left side of his head and moved it closer to his mouth while his face showed a more cautionary expression towards the situation he knew could be dangerous. He spoke sternly and yet calmly into the microphone "Unidentified aircraft, you're uh. You're getting very close to our instead air space. Please divert. And soon." Earl said. However, it didn't seem he would get a natural response from the supposed people he thought he was talking to.
"Sssssslow down…" Said the voice of Kukulkan over the radio, but Earl at first would hear a static sound and heavy interference, he can tell that Kukulkan like other deities wasn't quite adept in radio communication or using their telepathic power to tune into radio signal. "Follow me...mortalssssss." The plumed serpent said again as he was seen making an acrobatic twist and turn around in front of Earl's plane before making a dive to the ground towards the temple of Artemis. "Your patron Jackal awaitssss there mortalssss. Come and land by the clearing near the temple'sssss ground." The serpent instructed as he flew over the temple's roof and lead Earl in. Angie to her excitement saw that Kukulkan was flying around making a beacon out of his body to signal them.
Earl looked to Angie rather confused, but shrugged, "'You really need to tell me more about your deity friends Angie. I think these old eyes just saw a flying snake with wings…" Earl said confused. However, Logan looked out of the plane's window and saw Kukulkan as well. He grinned in awe by the majesty of the flying serpent. "Don't worry Uncle Earl. Just follow him he's on our side." Logan said. Despite Kukulkan's flying majesty in the sky there was however the fears of snakes and serpents Logan kept stuffed in the back of his mind so it wouldn't escape. However, foggy parts of this fear came out time and time again causing Logan to shudder for no real reason to Kukulkan. Earl looked over to Logan noticing quickly he was becoming naturally stiff. "Hey. I don't think flying snakes are in the list of things you fear. Besides falling, bees, and pictures of the ocean abyss." Earl reminded.
"Maybe he's adding it to his list now actually." Angie replied sarcastically as she saw Earl flew in and landed his aircraft by the grassy open ground of the temple's front, once Earl had taxied his aircraft into place and stop, he would see Anubis walking out of the temple wearing his silky cotton white outfit from ancient Ewegyptian period of Ptolemaic Dynasty, Howllenic Period for some. On his neck was a black crystal gem shaped like a teardrop. His garment also sported a white dress like trouser underneath, his belt had a Xiphos sword strapped and sheathed in place. The sword itself has its hilt shaped like a wolf's head and the blade was like a literal tongue out of the canine's mouth. "Catsablanca was quite an adventure city wasn't it? Shame that we have to leave so soon with so much enemies looking for us there." Said Anubis as he saw Earl and his nephew disembarking alongside Angie from the plane.
"Classy joint, but we got some work to do. Maybe I'll go back next time," Earl said casually while exiting the plane alongside Logan and Angie. Right as Earl touched the ground he breathed in the fresh sea breeze and sighed feeling the natural winds act as a way for his soul and mind to be put at ease. "Pretty darn amazing you having a million bucks somehow. Is there such thing as a poor deity?" Earl jokingly asked while Logan himself looked around the setting.
Logan looked to the temple by tilting his head upwards and letting his mouth drop. The place by now was like other ancient places, but unlike those he felt here the setting and the hillside luxury the structure had made it somewhat more magnificent. He wasn't aware for the moment Kukulkan was near him and kept his trance-like he kept on the monument.
"Well to be honest there was one poor deity with needy pockets." Anubis smirked to Earl and Angie, this further raised her interests to hear the inner workings of the deity universe out of curiosity as she had seen with her own eyes what he was capable of doing. "So who was it then Anubis? Seeing that on average the Egyptian deities I have met so far...you and Thoth at least...worth billions of dollars by today." Said Angie as they walked into the temple's interior for some shelter. "Aten, the Sun disk. He was a clown and a jest to the pantheon, so obnoxious was his personality that the populace decried him and tossed him out of the pantheon. Believe it or not, he used to have a campaign of his own to make him the replacement for Ra, called Make Ewegypt Great Again." Said Anubis as he sighed out in displeasure.
Listening to this Earl nodded his head while reaching into the pocket of his aviator jacket and pulling out a brown and well made cigar. He simply bit the end off using his mouth before pulling out a chrome zippo lighter to light it. "Sorry about the smokes. Uh. Yeah. I guess a dish can 'dish' out some anger. So what else? Was he used as fine china? Maybe some pate." Earl joked. He held the cigar in his mouth and inhaled smoke into his mouth and tasted its earthiness. Seemingly nothing got to the man. Logan however smelled the collecting smoke and cringed despite the smell being nostalgic to him. Even as a pup he'd remember family visits and Earl in a recliner smoking. "Here too Earl? Really?" Logan complained slightly.
"Really Earl? It's a good thing that we're not caught red handed by Artemis or something. By the way where is she now?" Angie asked looking at Anubis who sat down by a wooden table with some stools for them to accompany him. "Well she's off to Hellas by this point, the Howllenic Pantheon need as much deities protecting their homeland as possible by this point. Not a pretty sight if you will." Said Anubis as he placed the map of Anatolia on the table along with the golden Paw of Midas that he brought along for the trip, Angie opened the scripture she bought from Catsablanca and compared it with some of records they had in the museum. "Alright then, the records said that we have a certain key that we need to access the Mausoleum of Zoey. But it's locked away in the Mausoleum itself so we can't access it." Said Angie as she went through the original notes of the archive but something didn't add up. The original writing was a translation from ancient Greek to Roman Greek. Surely something would have changed over the years.
"You should check the scripture as well, seeing that it is a much more...recent document regarding the key." Said Anubis as he read the scripture on the table, his attention was apparently fixed on the document's passages and paragraphs stating a certain change in location had occurred. Angie gasped out seeing these passages and immediately start translating it to Logan and Earl. "It says…'By order of Emperor Justinian, the Sanctum of Sacred Wisdom was constructed and the Key to the Mausoleum was sealed within. Some of the men mentioned that in their diggings they felt sick when they reach down to the lower section of the Mausoleum...a plague followed them to the capital and the empire was stricken by it. A blue liquid as bright as the stars but...cold as the ice, anywho drank it shall be stricken by a disease that drives them to death faster than anyone dare dreamed. And yet, some felt strangely healthy, immune to the diseases. We suspect they were protected the Lord above, but...it too was an illusion as they grow more and more savage.'" Angie read the rather disturbing lines about the mausoleum and what was inside it, the passages gave off a rather disturbing chill to her and Logan. But for Anubis, his stoic and calm nature remained undisturbed.
The visions of a plague causing other mammals to turn into what sounded like savages beasts, and for them to go feral gave Logan an odd flash back to the predator events in Zootopia and how predatory mammal went feral almost. He shuddered feeling the judgmental eyes of people gaze down on him back then. He thought back to the scripture and shook his head. "Sounds a lot like that event that happened a while back. You know I'm partly an officer because of that." Logan said in a nervous tone. "So is this the conspiracy just more mythical." Logan said anxiously.
"Not quite Logan." Anubis suddenly corrected him, surprisingly enough the deity didn't give off a rather condescending statement or explanation to the events of the mortal's realities and histories. "You see, the Eitr that you found in the Yucatan Peninsula was an example of Jormungandr poison, which was also the blood of Ymir that created life. At the time of the Bisontine, I saw that the Eitr was so poisonous to the mortals of the time that they soon died of the noxious fumes at first contact. Not even enough time to be driven insane and feral. I think that by these days, with mortals being more healthy, the Eitr might have an edge to drive them feral once again. Simply because it has time." The deity concluded and sighed out rubbing his temple feeling nauseating just as much as Logan.
"In a word, so powerful that it weeds out the weak and drive the strong to insanity and ferocious savagery. Reducing civilization to the base instincts." Angie uttered out in fear and realization that the Eitr could practically be weaponized as a plague, a toxin. The thought of a form of it existed in the Nighthowler flowers gave her more chills. "Age old mythologies suddenly strike too close to home for my liking here." Said Angie as she turned to Anubis for more questions. "But...Anubis, what was Jormungandr involvement in all this? I mean first this was about the Paw of Midas and now suddenly Jormungandr turned out to be involved in it." She asked while looking at Anubis's face.
Anubis looked to Logan strangely enough, he apparently was eyeing Logan's face but something in Logan told him that the black jackal was seeing something more than just his physical appearance. "Jormungandr at the time was fighting against other deities, trying to bring one more step of Ragnarok to reality as the prophecy foretold. But he failed. His poison was found in Kukulkan's homeland, gathered into a molten sanctum to quarantine it from the rest of the population of the Mayan, the other cache of it, here in Bisontine territories, was hoarded into the Mausoleum of Zoey, deep in the underground sanctum walled off from contact with the Earth. That way the Eitr can not infect other parts of the Earth and bring more poisons. However, it breathes life into the petrified statue of Zoey. Meaning that when you find her, you will hear her screaming from her petrified golden state." The jackal deity concluded with a somber and solemn tone looking down at the map provided to him by none other than Athena herself, the marked Mausoleum itself had a jackal skull and two bones crossed to show that the place was far too dangerous to be accessed by anyone.
Logan didn't seem to take the information here well, or any of the information given well since he turned stiff and immovable. He breathed in a heavy breathing knowing such a poisonous and malicious substance existed, but moreover was who had created it. Jormungandr the giant serpent. This vision alone made Logan more aware of the threat of the Eitr. Looking back on how the Eitr was stored and hidden deep underground almost made it more like a radioactive substance being held where the radiation could not affect others. "This crap really bug me. I don't know why. I hate snakes, and this poison is from one… but it's from a frost giant that gives life? So it's good? But no wait. It's poison, and you stuffed it below the surface underground like nuclear waste so it's bad. And it turns people insane and kills others so it's actually double bad." Logan said confused in his tone.
Earl shrugged as well while looking back to Athena's map. It definitely looked like hers since it was much more light and thoughtfully written out as with someone with wisdom. Earl himself looked down to the skull and crossbones and grumbled. "Don't be confused by anything logan. Whatever this shit is its baaaad news boy…" Earl said with amore stern voice.
"Precisely so. I still need to get in contact with the Norse Pantheon on how to destroy the Eitr from mortal realm permanently. But there's not much results so far. Hopefully we can find one before the next plague strike." Said Anubis as he pointed them to the depiction of the symbol under the Hagia Sophia. "As for this, the scripture starts to make sense now. The sanctum for the Key is underneath the Hagia Sophia, I suspect that Justinian was trying to keep it there for future explorations back to the Mausoleum but he passed away before anything could be done." Angie's speculation was shared by Kukulkan as he whispered his chilling voice to her ears. "I sssshare your sssskepticism mortal one. Finding the Paw of Midasssss wassss a bonus but the Eitr alwayssss be a draw for anyone finding it. One sip and you will be long lived, but as the years went on, your mind ssssslip and your ssssanity fall to the abyss before you too succumb to the madness. They may not have known thisssss. But I sssssuspect that they would have to learn it the hard way regardlesssssss."
But while they were discussing their plans and clues, they didn't realized that high in sky about 7 miles away from them, a UAV drone was circling above recording their conversation and feeding the operators of it their findings. On a freighter ship mooring off the coast of the Ionian land, a UAV operator was watching them, accompanied by Flynn and Cloey, the two thieves saw the two deities present there discussing with Angie and Logan as well as Earl. "Well well now, we have deities in the mix? So who's the mad one then Cloey, us, our employer or them? Either way I don't know about you but I think I'll take the Paw of Midas regardless." Said Flynn in a sarcastic manner while smiling teasingly at Cloey.
Cloey rolled her eyes and looked to the screen again looking to Kukulkan most of all. To her he was the most abnormal one of them since he was a flying snake practically. Aside from that Anubis's dark appearance despite him being a jackal really gave her some off put feelings. "Well then looks like we are going to have to do some divine intervention then. Interception rather. I got a feeling the snake one, Kukulkan I believe, I think he'll catch up to you in a blink." She then looked to Anubis and smiled. His body was certainly attractive as was given usually to him, but something else caught her eye. His position over the others and his careful planning. "So what's a grave hound like him doing leading a team of tomb raiders and wolves? Shouldn't he be burying people?" Cloey asked with an odd teasing tone.
Flynn however chuckled and smirked teasingly at her for the question as he laughed his head off. "Him...you mean the edge lord with the cringey fashion sense? For your information darling, he IS the lord of the Duat and he protects tomb by...pre-emptively plundering them. Is that good enough for you yet? Now where's my kiss?" He smugly smirked at her while having a rather playful smile on his face preparing to be kissed or slap by Cloey.
Cloey simply rolled her eyes and gave Flynn a small peck on his cheek before she moved back and wiped her mouth on her sleeve. "There." She said with a smirk before turning her attention and focus back to the monitor. "And don't look now. I see your last year's model in there." Cloey said pointing to Angie. She then looked to Logan and felt her eyes widen a bit stunned by him. "And hello you… isn't' he a looker." Cloey said stunned.
However their moment of innocence and playfulness was cut short by the growling raspy voice of their employer as he grumbled and growled at their direction in an increasingly animalistic and feral way. "Enough the both of you! At last I have found it the location of the second Eitr cache! Soon, I, El Capitan shall ascend to the Prophet of the Lord and cleanse the world of Pagan Demons!" He cackled and began laugh an almost cartoonish evil laugh that made himself a silly caricature. However he soon coughed and fell to the floor writhing in pain and rolling on the ground in pain. He reached for his Oxygen mask and placed it over his muzzle and began to breath in and out.
"Okay then...El Capitan whatever your name is. You know Cloey I seriously have to admit I made the worst career choice ever with picking up this guy's contract." Said Flynn with a shrug while looking at the pitiful sight of the vicious and fearsome El Capitan reduced to that of an old man coughing out, long lived but was still vulnerable to ailments and diseases. Perhaps a reminder of what he was and still is.
[hr]
Istanbul, Turkey
The evening left the city of Istanbul, once Constantinople, in a state of serene beauty. The exotic beauty of the city's diverse population and various quarters of the city lit up their lamps and lights, attracting tourists and busy businesses stay up all night to serve its various guests. Under Thoth's moonlight, Anubis cruised towards the riverside of the Hagia Sophia, National History Museum of Turkey. There he moored the speed boat off of it for Angie and Logan to break into the place via the sewer entrance. "Alright you two hope that you remember the drill, find the entrance to the vault and access it. If I were you, I'd start with the lower echelons of the museum first." Anubis stated and handed Logan and Angie each of them a tranquilizer pistol. The weapons were apparently M92F Bearretta model with a laser attachment below the barrel and a suppressor attached to the muzzle.
With his weapon in hand Logan took a moment to admire what seemed to be a change of pace for the moment. He took a quick look at each of the darts and already knew tonight's mission was to be made non lethal. He carefully put the darts away after opening his thigh compartment for later, and then looked to Angie with a nervous look. He already knew that despite no killing involved for today he would be participating in breaking and entering. Possible robbery despite the great or good. Something he knew being a policeman he could not accomplish without some guilt. "Alright. Here comes some good time heisting action…" Logan said before making his way through the water to find a sewer. He held his breath and felt his gag reflex steady knowing the water here was not clean as it should. He held his nose up to ward away any of the awful smells.
"Here goes nothing. You're good with a laptop Anubis?" Angie asked as she put the weapon into her thigh holster and check the camera and earpiece on her head. Anubis in the meantime was seen opening a laptop and booted up the device, much to both Logan and Angie's surprise he was quite familiar with how to use it, he ran a operational check on both Logan and Angie's cams and found them to be in perfect working order. "Good to go now. Good luck to both of you." Said Anubis as he gave them a thumb up smiling at the two before seeing them running into the sewer underneath the museum.
However, they weren't the only parties involved in the heist there, not far away, Flynn was making his way on the rooftop towards the window on the top dome of the Hagia Sophia, the area on the roof was relatively lightly guarded as most of the security assets were focused on the priceless artifacts inside the place. "Alright then Cloey, show time. I'm going down to see what's cooking between Angie and...her temporal boyfriend before I swing in and make a smashing entry." Said Flynn in a smug manner as he began to rappel down the building's roof. As he rappel down, he saw that the security down there were walking about with their flashlights shining the area around them to make sure that nobody was breaking in. "There's a guy below me. There's a guy below me." Said Flynn over the comms in an almost playful manner before he dropped down and snapped the security guard's neck. "Okay now that I'm in, where to first? Oh yes that's right the basement." He then went out towards the storage area of the museum to look for clues. While then, Angie and Logan were making their ways towards the basement area of the museum, there, they found various crates and boxes of artifacts and relics from various countries and eras. Mostly were from the Ottomammals and older than that, the Howllenic City states on the Anatolia Peninsula. "Look at these Logan, all sorts of relic from different cultures, they all come from various unique cultures so different from one another...all in one geographical area." Said Angie in awe as she couldn't help but look at the various priceless artifacts.
Logan looked to Angie's awestruck face and then back to the variou artifacts in the crates. To him the placement of pieces of history he knew Angie would die just to have in her living room were poorly placed. However, he smirked to Anige's face and tapped on her shoulder before shaking his head. "Nah-ah. I think someone claimed these relics now. Not ours babe." He said noting Angie's more lust struck face as she skimmed through each of the artifacts. "Besides that we got some… Weird psycho liquid to take care of now. Cmon." Logan said while he moved further into the museum.
"Right I know Logan. Sorry about that hun." She sighed out defeatedly knowing that despite her wishes, she can't quite have them right away. Then the two came to a strangely cordoned off area of the basement, she saw "UNDER CONSTRUCTION" ribbons along with red safety cones to keep various employees off of it. "Uh, Logan...I think we found something here…" Said Angie as she pointed him to the strange darkened underground hallway behind the ribbons. His infrared and night vision modes can make out various stone structures built from the Bisontine era with a twisting flight of stairs down towards what could be the sanctum of the Key. "Looks like you two hit the jackpot. The construction style fit Bisontine time not to mention the relief on the walls and depiction." Said Anubis over the comms as he saw that the depiction seem to take on a bit more medieval, early dark age style of depiction that Logan could recognize from various castles and medieval themed media.
It was something he was more comfortable with historical, but even then just the basics. Logan moved to the fluorescent colored construction ribbon and moved it out of the way carefully rather than being reckless here and tearing it up. "Don't tear it. Not sure if the guards on shift come down here." Logan said before he peeked his head over the side of the wall by the basement. He could hear some of the guards conversion among themselves rather casually despite the language barrier. He rose a brow to the professionalism here. "That is if they are on patrol at all…" Logan said as he took the circular flight of stairs down into the dark. As darkness krept over his pupils glew a blue color. His vision showed the world around him as a customized choice of blue tinted night vision rather than just green. The darker the place got the higher he needed to set the intensity of the night vision his vision had. "Watch your step here. This is going to trip you if you're not careful…" Logan then switched on his EMF vision to trace any electronic signals such as camera, or motion sensors. His vision unred into a dark flat blue color while times such as running wires or circuitry turned green.
"Don't worry, we're nocturnal remember?" Said Angie as she and Logan began to make their way down the stairs towards the sanctum, as they went down the stairs, Angie saw murals and various depictions of what happened to the Paw of Midas. Much to their surprises, the depiction wasn't about the King Midas himself but rather a legion of Bisontine going on an expedition into the land of Lydia and Phrygia, ancient kingdoms of the Midas myth. One depiction show a legionnaire reaching his paw into the river Pactolus to pick up gold nuggets. His paw turned to gold and was forced to amputate the mutated paw, then the Golden Paw was transported to Constantinople, setting into motion the events of the past as mortals see it. "No wonder why something was off, Midas was a donkey, or a horse in some tellings of his mythos. He would have had hooves not a paw. Not only that but he washed his hooves in the Pactolus river before so that would make it impossible for the Paw to be his own." Said Angie in awe as she examine the mural depiction of how the Bisontine obtained the Golden Paw.
Nervously Logan thought of the river Midas had rinsed his hands in and thought of the implications this had such as the river still bearing such powers of turning people and objects to gold, or if said gold nuggets were there would someone steal them? "You don't think the river… or the. Nevermind." Logan shook his head out and focused on the golden paw of Midas. Or the supposed paw now that Logan and Angie have had their fill of a revelation. Logan looked back up at the murals and sighed. "Looks like this is some type of mess now. Anything this thing touches turns to gold and then those pieces of gold touch something and then that becomes gold, and then… Oh God." Logan held his head in confusion and groaned in pain. "See now I got a migraine headache. Ach…" Logan complained.
"I'm honestly more surprised that the river hasn't poisoned anyone or turn them into gold...yet." Said Angie with a tinge of fear in her voice. Apprehension grew as they made their ways down to the inner sanctum where they saw a massive set of booby traps along the hallways, ready to be triggered once a pressure plate was stepped on. "Alright...just what we need, a massive sanctum, booby traps ready to crush anyone going in here...just like the Conquistador fort." She looked at the floor in front of her seeing the various letters written in Greek before her, there was feeling that the wrong letter might activate the booby trap mechanism. "Okay I need a hint, something here about Midas or maybe something about him...think Angie think…" She muttered trying to figure out the keywords that made sense.
"Midas grew resentful of wealth and splendor after the whole Golden touch debacle with Dionysus, I think the riddle might be something about the sin of wealth." Said Anubis over the comms as he watched Angie preparing herself for the final step forward. She then looked down at the floor of the Greek letter and read them one by one, "Opulent is sinful…" She uttered. The realization soon propelled her forward, taking a step at the right tile then hopped over to the next following a pattern that lead her to the otherside without setting off booby traps. "I made it through! Just follow my footsteps Logan and you'll be fine!" She shouted to him from the other side of the corridor the place, Logan can see that there were two massive doors with sculpted out figures of Dionysus or Bacchus to the Romans, Zeus or Jupiter, Hera or Juno, Athena/Minerva, Hephaestus/Vulcan and so on. With Zeus being on top of the pyramid of the God's sitting on his golden throne on the top of Mt. Olympus with a golden eagle on his hand.
After Logan had crossed the treacherous pressure pit maze he looked to the pyramid statue of the gods and focused his attention right onto Zeus's statue. It was odd how such an elaborate and intricate set up sculpture of art had been hidden underground. However, as Logan looked at the statue some odd feeling came over him. "So. Why is a museum hiding all of this? Is this too important for the public eye or is something more cryptic and mysterious going on here. There's no way none of the staff knew about this, and had to keep a zipped up lip." Logan spouted while looking to Zeus's statue. It didn't take much though for Logan to decipher who Zeus was and his position over the other gods. "I assume the one in the chair is the head deity? Uh. Maybe with a larger than life ego seeing this… Statue built up with him on the very top." Logan said while his eyes were looking and eyeing the other deity figures on the statue.
"That's Zeus, King of Mt. Olympus and head of the Pantheon...he's notorious for having affairs with mortal women everywhere. Father of Heracles, Theseus and countless other demigods." Said Angie in awe as he approached the doors seeing that it was locked tight, the locking mechanism was a set of five switches with the Greek symbols of Alpha, Beta, Omega, Delta, Gamma on them, waiting to be pulled. However it didn't make much sense to her as the switches didn't appear to be made in conjunction with the gate itself, other than an amalgamation of various Classical Age references threw together in a stew of a tomb. "Whoever made this, was probably Orthodox Christian, not quite adept to the Classical Howllenic culture preceded it." Said Angie as examined the switches, noting that the first switch she pulled unlocked the barricade at the top of the gate. "The Alpha switch controlled the Barricade of Zeus, let's see what the others do. Hopefully not setting off traps." She then switched the next one, noting that the Beta switch did nothing, a bait switch apparently. "Very clever, from bait and switch to literal bait switch." She commented.
But while she and Logan were trying the switches out, Flynn had snuck down to the catacomb and saw them working on the gate, he hide himself behind a stone corner and used a pair of binoculars zooming up on Logan's appearance, his grin dropped however as he felt something was oddly out of place. He did not recall seeing a robot accompanying Angie at all and yet the laser microphone of the binoculars recorded her conversation with the robot wolf referred to it as "Logan". "Cloey, you're getting this? I mean, this has just got a lot more bizarre than I thought." Said Flynn as he kept his eyes on the two to report on them. Most notably Logan back to Cloey seeing that she has an interest in him.
Cloey viewing the footage looked to Logan puzzles, and yet shocked. She watched as the red colored cyber wolf moved and pulled switches. Mumbling to himself of course words "Nope, Damn, and crap." Cloey rose her brow at him intrigued and yet not at all off put. "So. She's dating a sex bot? Or is there something else going on here I don't get. He was covered in fur and flesh a minute ago." She squinted at his armored plating and nted he still had some muscle indents in him, but no enough to make him a hulking behemoth. "An oddly well built robot I might add. See if you can get closer to him. Not too close. I think I want him." She said as she quietly laughed to herself.
"Oh really Cloey? My muscle and dreamy good luck aren't enough for your eyes? Alright if a pred sex bot gives you wet dream then me see if I can get some photos for your pinup posters." The horse grumbled as he then slowly made his way towards them. However unlike Angie's brilliant maneuver, he was much less finease than her and Logan. The moment he made a step forward to the letter tiles, his hoof landed on the wrong tile and snapped, the tile fell off into a chasm full of spikes and other sharp objects. "Damn it." He hissed out frustratingly as he struggled to lift his large hoof out of it. But he soon saw that Angie had pulled the last switch, the Omega one, it removed the last of the three barricades and opened the door to reveal the vault. Inside, there were no treasures whatsoever, there was only one thing there, a pendulum like object, round in shape, with an appearance that reminiscent of a grapefruit used by Dionysus to make wine. On it was a sculpted face of Midas. "Cloey, they got the key...be ready to hit the alarm system on my mark. By the way, what do you say about a tracking beacon on them?" He asked with a pistol pulled out of his holster and aimed at either Angie or Logan.
"Oh. Hard choice. You have the girl on the right which a beacon will stick to. Since she's actually normal, but then you have, uh, heh, Logan as she keeps calling him on the left. He won't feel a tracker on him, but it might fall off of all that armor on him. He looks like a suit of power armor or something." Cloey joked looking at the two of them. She was more fixated though on Logan's odd appearance having yet to ever have her sights on a machine as advanced as him yet. "Yeah maybe officer boy there. Ironwolf, Robowolf. Hope you beacon can stick to him." Cloey said.
"Okay. Here goes nothing luv." Flynn then took aim at Logan's back, at where his rumps began to take shape and fired his suppressed tranquilizer gun, the tracking beacon was a bead like device with a sticky glue at the front of the round, it stuck on Logan's back without him knowing and Flynn duck down behind the stone structure waiting for Logan and Angie to obtain the Pendulum. He peeked out and saw that Angie was putting the pendulum into her rucksack for safekeeping before walking out with Logan. "Heading back out now Cloey, be ready on my go." Said Flynn as he head out of the underground area, his rush and hastiness push him forward to the exit but the hooves of a horse weren't as stealthy as the paws of a wolf, let alone a feline. Angie and Logan's sensitive ears can hear the sound of his hooves clopping on the stone floor as they went up the stairs now being much more cautious than before. "Cloey hit the security system now! I need absolute darkness to get out quietly!" Flynn instructed over the earpiece, on the other end, Cloey was on a laptop sitting on a rooftop of a nearby building. She tapped some buttons and access the building's power grid, she then hit the shutdown button, turning off the lights and camera system. "Thanks Luv, now at least you can stalk Robowolf and his shiny chrome armor...you perv." He teased her before running out of the Hagia Sophia with only 15 minutes to go.
"Damn it looks like someone else is trying to beat us to the punch! Let's get out of here!" Angie hastened Logan as she ran out of the Hagia Sophia's interior with him. As they ran a security guard walking about patrolling the place caught sight of her with Logan. He reached for his radio and call his colleagues of intruders, alerting them to the thieves. "Not now!" She fired her tranquilizer at his neck, the dart struck the ram's neck and sedated him instantly causing him to fall down on the floor sleeping with his walky-talky fell to the ground. "What's going on? Respond. Something's going on by the West Wing, support unit confirm his status." Said the Dispatcher on the line as additional securities ran to the site.
Logan as he ran picked up the radio and cleared his throat out to mimic the best accent he could to the radio dispatcher. "Uhhh… Looks like someone pulled the alarms?... Uh its a prank! SOMEONE'S PRANKING!" Logan shouted while running with not much success on his convising. "Yeah I don't think they bought that hun! Fucking book it!" Logan shouted.
"Just great you just have to inform them of our presence now do you?" Anubis growled frustratingly as he put his laptop down and folded it into a backpack strapped on his back with a trio of strings slung over his chest. The deity fired up the motorboat and began to cruise out to the side of Hagia Sophia's waterfront, he slowed down when he saw Angie and Logan were about to jump on to his boat, as the boat came to a slow, Angie and Logan leaped over the guardrails of the pavement and landed on the backseats of the motorboat with a loud thud. The Jackal deity had to brace the ship's sides to prevent it from tumbling over before sitting down to cruise them out to safety. "Let's meet up with your uncle and head out to the Pactolus river, we have what we need now." Said Anubis as he cruised the boat towards the sea of Marmara direction to pick Earl up before heading down the Pactolus.
Flynn however was more of a cautious player when sneaking out of the museum, he let the various mammal security officers there disperse to multiple directions before making a run towards the dock of the city, sneaking out while still wearing his thief outfit was a bit of a dangerous gamble seeing that he could be caught at anytime by the police force of town. The equine head into an alleyway and changed his outfit to a more fitting casual attire before going out to the docks. There, he met with Cloey again in front of the freighter they were on for the past few days out at sea, the S.S Shaheen. A large black rusty freighter once hauling oil now converted to a mobile base on the sea. "Hello there darling. Miss me? Okay I got some pinup posters for you girl. They may not be high definition but sure as hell give you wet dreams." Flynn smirked at Cloey as he handed her the binoculars he used to spy on Angie and Logan, the device also had a spy cam attached to it on the top to take photos of any subjects that might be of interest to the users. "Also tracker is working now you can stalk your dreamy sex bot anywhere it goes." Flynn snid ely remarked as he checked the PDA screen of the tracking beacon attached on Logan as it sent out signals heading down the Sea of Marmara and down to Pactolus river.
The night was dark enough to the point Cloey needed to squint relatively hard into the binoculars to actually see the group, but as soon as she did she saw her target. Logan looking rather embarrassed with a dopey expression on his face. He seemed to be making an anxious smile someone would make after having messed up. "Well there he is. If I didn't know any better Flynn I think Logan might actually be living. He has this nervous look on him. Staring at the guy at the front. Who is…" She looked at Anubis perplexed, but not as perplexed as Logan. Seeing his dark colored fur blend into the night and his heavily pointed ears was a sight to see. "A very odd looking jackal. Your former ex has a lot of interesting characters." Cloey spoke as she lowered the binoculars. "If i were you I'd keep a close eye out. She's not working with normal folks." Cloey stated glaring intensely.
"Neither are you two!" Said the booming and raspy El Capitan as he came out of the freighter waving his cane at their direction and knocking on Flynn's head repeatedly before coughing out again. "But at last I shall be able to find the Eitr and with it I will ascend to become the Lord's new Prophet!" He screeched out at the top of his lung causing Flynn to shush him repeatedly to avoid cringe worthy embarrassments from the dock workers. "Okay okay we get the point! No need to repeat that seriously…" Flynn sighed out before looking back at Cloey herself and grinned. "Okay so this guy is a bit of a looney but I can safely bet that we'll be just fine working with him. Right? After all the money's the matter not the LSD or Coke that he's been smoking." The equine smugly stated as he packed up his exploration gears on a truck with the expedition crew and began to make their ways to the Pactolus river by land. However, along the way, Cloey can see that El Capitan has been growing increasingly erratic.
His eyes darted around faster and faster, showing a case of paranoia and symptoms of hyperactive behaviours that wouldn't be normal in any mammals at this rate. His mouth began to foam and his hands shake and fidget while holding onto his walking cane. The money might be important to her and Flynn, but the fact remains, they were working for a rabid employer and the money wouldn't matter if they were admitted to a mental asylum and proven to be clinically insane.
The behavior and body language of their employer made Cloey nervous for her own well being, but she was way far into the operation by now, and time spent alone with the mad capitan was already spent more than actual money. She crossed her arms watching him anxiously knowing his cane was about the only thing keeping him on his feet. Something clearly went wrong before with him. Possibly a long time ago. "I really don't know. It's too late now. I spent so much on these voyages and so much time with him… Then again." She spoke pondering. She thought of what the man might do if he did in fact obtain the Eitr, and where she would fit in with his master plan. She didn't like the first thoughts that came to her mind. Either she would go unpaid, killed, or even enslaved in the man's army. "Just keep watch of him. I don't think money alone will keep me in this if it means we are ended up for something grizzly…" Cloey said ominously.
[hr]
While then Anubis was cruising the boat out to the Sea of Marmara heading South along the coast towards the area of the Pactolus river and enter it. On his cruise boat were Anige, Logan and Earl sitting together in the back. The digital map of the boat showed them that the area they were heading into was going to be a narrow and rough mountainous area, they will have to slow down and continue on foot when the time comes. "Logan I brought along a small improvised charging device for you, take your time with it trust me. You'll need the rest. Angie take the wheel for me." The jackal's hands were off the boat's steering wheel and let Angie took control for him while he picked up the tube of the charging cable, it was about 5 cm wide in diameter with a coupling at the tip. On the coupling's side was a locking mechanism operated by a lever. The device itself was a portable generator ran on diesel, not the best but it will have to do for Logan for the time being.
Logan looked at the device anxiously, and felt his pupils narrow at the thought of himself having the object inserted into part of his body. Especially out in the open in a moment such as now. Worst yet his nervous thoughts continued as Earl was right there with Anige as well on the boat with him. "Uh… Thanks?" Logan said attempting to sound positive and grateful for the attention he was receiving. However, the robot wolf looked to the object again and shook. "Anubis is it possible we can do this in a place… uh, private? I know where you're going to stick that after all." Logan commented a bit disgusted still by the whole cyber body he had.
"Actually, this one has a different method." Anubis reached for Logan's chest surprisingly, he slowly moved his palm to the locking mechanism on his chest and found an auxiliary energy port mounted on his left chest and stroke it. The lock released when Anubis pressed it inward and an automatic port slid open, revealing to the Jackal deity the reactor inside Logan's mechanized body and the glowing light it emits. Anubis gently inserted the cable into the port and tied it up to Logan's chest and locked it into place, ready to work. He then fired up the generator setting the recharge rate to medium. When energy flows into Logan's body he could feel the tingling sensation of being charged up and the relaxing feeling of being serviced like that of Alfred back home. On his blue HUD, he can see that his body's energy was at 35% and next to the counter was a wire plug icon showing that he was being charged up gradually. "There that should do it. Ever been on a boat before Earl?" Anubis asked his uncle. It was quite surprising to see the Jackal open up to Earl about a topic not related to airplanes or Earl's past.
Earl watched as Logan charged up and rested comfortably, but was caught off guard of course by Anubis's question. "Well uh. Once or twice. Not as long as a plane. Not much of a boat guy. Maybe a couple of cruises where I danced with some lovely ladies in a ballroom. Some fine wines, but those were just some vacations in the past." Earl said.
Logan as he rested his back to his seat more comfortable sighed recalling one cruise he went on once when he just entered teenhood. He could still remember Earl being a romancer and dancing well enough when he could enjoy his life. Though none of the relationships Earl had clearly never led to him being married. "Yep. We've gone on one cruise maybe. They're expensive you know Anubis. That was still pretty funny seeing you twirl that lady around." Logan said with a slight laugh.
Earl nodded while looking back to Anubis. "Yeah the way i see two people fall in love at sea. Went on a cruise seeing this was true, but I forgot her name. Eh. 45 years maybe it's a bit too late he?" Earl said rather casually.
"Maybe...I used to be on these lands when I was 40. Back then I was named Strategos, Field Army General of the Kingdom. I led my Jackal Guards landed on the shores of the Anatolia, we fought a fierce battle at Halicarnassus and ejected the Roman invaders off of it. Now coming back here, gives me nostalgies…" Said Anubis with a sigh looking at the mountains of the Anatolian coast, the majestic sight of region was clearly work of the diligent Gods and Titans like Prometheus and his brother alongside that of Geb, Nut, Oceanus, Uranus, Gaia and much more. As they reach into the Pactolus river, the boat had to slow down and Angie cruise it gently up the river stream. Her eyes scan the horizon for danger seeing that there was little in their ways for the time being other than rocky banks. As Logan and Earl looked down on either sides of the boat, they saw the sights of gold nuggets sparkling under the riverbed waiting for greedy paws and hooves to reach down and collect them.
Logan for one looked to the gold nuggets and felt a very cold shiver jolt down his spine. He looked too Angie with a terrified look despite the objects being simple inanimate objects. "Hey guys… I think we have more proof of this Midas guy." Logan uttered as he pointed down into the water.
Earl looked over the side and saw the golden gleam of the nuggets in the water and grunted in shock. "Wow. Don't touch guys! Not unless you want an amputated trophy of your arm." Earl said sternly and rather frank of the possible consequences of a greed filled touch. Both Logan and Earl both knew clearly what it meant to touch them. It was like looking at a gilded poison that would kill instantly. "Well if that doesn't scare you i don't know what does. Hopefully nobody else goes down this river before they are tempted to touch." Earl said.
Of course Earl's warning was heeded by his companions but to the opposing party, not so much. As El Capitan and his party of mercenaries heading into the river's point of origin, his erratic and insane behaviors began to become much more exacerbated by the proximity they share with the Eitr. He can sense it in the air, a sniff of its icy cold scent alone gave him the bone cracking hunch of a feral animal as he bellowed his hired guns to push deeper into the valley for the discovery of the Mausoleum. "Cloey, I'll lead them towards the Mausoleum, you take this and find Angie for me. See how far is she from us? We might want to let her find it first." Said Flynn as he handed Cloey the binoculars and PDA to help her track down the beacon on Logan's back.
The PDA showed the group of mercenaries and Cloey that the boat the others were traveling on was close to them. Of course a river nearby. Cloey looked back to El Capitan and cringed at his feral ways. "Uh. Okay they aren't too far away from us. I guess that guy's feeling isn't too good. Or if he is a guy that is." Cloey aid thinking back on Logan. She still had no idea on how he functioned or he was his own independent machine. She couldn't think long again as El Capitan's erratic behaviors and the blindness of the soldiers around her were disturbing. She learned to Flynn and sighed. "The closer we get the worst this guy gets…" Cloey said anxious.
"Right, I guess getting away from him would help a bit. Think of it like a fresh air hike shall we? Cheerio." Said Flynn as he waved her off, Cloey would then make her way through the forest of the area down to the nearby river to spy on them. She would see that Anubis had tied his boat to a nearby riverbank and the large tree bark there. The passengers had disembarked from the boat with Anubis helping them with their equipment and weapons. They were limited on firepower from what she can see but the moment Anubis's scepter morphed out of a gem in his palm convinced her otherwise that Flynn's ex might have garnered more than just divine intervention but divine friendship. "Alright then this is the plan. Earl, you go with Logan and Angie to the Mausoleum, I'll stir up trouble in the back of their lines and sabotage their equipment to delay their labor force." Anubis instructed as he handed the handguns to Earl and Angie respectively, as for Logan he handed him an MP5 SMG with 4 magazines to use. For Anubis, Cloey can see that he was bringing a Xiphos sword and a recurve bow on his back made from wood, ornate with gold and a tree sapling that gave it the durability to last multiple shots and be used as a makeshift melee weapon. On his belt he had a dagger slung at the ready once the fighting comes too close for him.
Comparatively the weapons chosen by Anubis looked centuries out of date compared to what the mercenaries had. To Cloey it made sense for Logan to have a relatively advanced SMG with him, but for Anubis to look so ornate and out of time seemed odd for Cloey. She put her binoculars down after listening into the the conversation knowing that Anubis somehow already knew the forces were there as well. As she watched Angie, Logan, and Earl depart away from Anubis she stopped herself from talking on the radio. Partly due to the the fact she knew Anubis was outmatched centuries in weaponry, but also the fact she wasn't sure she wanted to know what El Capitan's insanity would lead to. Just the thought of his crazed motives, and feral personality made Cloey flow with guilt. All she wanted was the money. Not how many people would be affected by him. She moved her hand away from her radio and simply watched Anubis seemingly commit some type of suicide using his old weaponry. "I almost want you to win." Cloey said to herself.
Anubis would then begin to sprint through the forest up to the narrow footpaths the expedition of El Capitan was using, the deity showed off his athletic prowess by climbing up the trees and parkour his way on the branches and hopped off to the high rocks overhead of the expedition. He saw that the mercenaries were using truck convoys to funnel troops and equipment through the valley into the area of the Mausoleum. "Show time." He muttered as he reached for three arrows from the quiver on his back with his left hand holding the bow. He leaped off a rock and as he fell down, his three arrows were strung and loose, they flew at the truck's engines, each arrows slammed into their individual targets and exploded. Turned out they were explosive tips arrows meant to sow chaos and panic. Once Anubis landed, he parkoured towards the jeep in front of him as the mercenaries fired off their turrets to ward him off only to see him putting the bow away and draw his Xiphos and jumped up, thrusting the blade into the neck of the gunner before swinging it around hacking and slashing the other two on the vehicles into a pool of blood.
Seeing the jackal deity's sudden agility and combat prowess out match men in modern day armor, and modern day equipment was a sudden shock to Cloey. Her jaw dropped seeing he had quite a few rick up his sleeve, and his expert use of shock and awe studden her. She grabbed hold of her own pistol and then snuck around the trees getting closer to the battlefield and to intercept Anubis. It was now she got on her radio seeing his skill she needed to warn the other troops. "Uh boys. We just got pounded from behind by some… black jackal." She radioed in as she followed Anubis.
Flynn was heard reaching for his radio with static signal coming from the other end before finally his voice was heard replying to her. "Wait what? You mean that Anubis thing? Well get out of there Cloey! Forget about the workers!" He scowled frustratingly to her, but he sounded concern and fearful. Was it concern for her well being? No time to ponder and rationalize the thoughts, she had to make a decision. She saw that Anubis was now facing a BMD-3 airborne APC, the turret aimed its main gun at Anubis's face with the powerful 30mm autocannon ready to blow his face apart. There was no way his sword and arrow can pierce its hides and for a minute Cloey thought that she can rest easy with the fact that Anubis was good as dead. But her relief was cut short when she saw him levitating off the ground, the rock and pebbles around him began to levitated from the ground and gather around him with his eyes glew bright like the lanterns until they were both pale. From both eyes an intense and bright ray blasted through the hull of the BMD as his growl took on a more otherworldly quality. Anubis moved the beam upward and split the turret apart and the vehicle exploded into a burning husk, sending the remaining mercenaries and workers fleeing from their vehicles.
As the mercenaries ran off, so to did Cloey after seeing Anubis's display of power. She could only describe what she saw as a superhero or villain from a comic book or film. Just by seeing the laser like power from Anubis alone made her run back into the forest dodging trees and stepping through the dirt not to meet the same fate as her allies. "Nope! Not like that I'm not!... The guy can fire lasers from his eyes… And… He's weird alright? Just plain and simple he's a super powered beast. How did he do that?" Cloey asked in her radio. It was soon clear to her Anubis had his name for a reason.
"Goddamn it! Just get to my position and don't get spotted on the way! At least we have plan B!" The equine thief gasped out over the comms, apparently he had seen the Death Gaze power Anubis displayed from a distance. He may not have seen it in full like Cloey did, but one thing was certain, Cloey's his eyes and ears and he better listen to what she had to say or risk being ill prepared. Once Cloey had reached his position, Flynn was hiding behind a tree, he grabbed her from behind and placed his hoof over her mouth and cuddle her behind a bush with El Capitan next to him observing Angie's group. "Alright you made it, lovely. We're going to let them go in first then we'll catch them with their pants down." He instructed with a shush.
Before his eyes, he saw Angie, Earl and Logan was standing over a pile of rock a worthless sight without any kind of hints as to the construction of a Mausoleum had occurred there, Angie took a step forward and begin to dig through the ruins and pebbles, searching for signs of a tomb. She moved the stone boulders aside, revealing sculpted images of the Olympian Pantheons and signs of construction. "Ah! Found it this must be the tomb!" Angie giggled gleefully as her digging intensify, soon enough, she unearthed a stone staircase leading down into the subterranean level.
"This is it. Come on let's head down there and seal the Paw inside, so no one can find it." Said Angie as she began to lead them into the tomb. At first, they found various sculptured figurines of King Midas as a mighty stallion and a handsome steed, perhaps as a way to have some last minute vanity to comfort the bitter old man. There were also figurines for his daughter, Marigold or Zoey in some sources, Apollo, Dionysus and other deities Anubis familiar with but in animal forms of the Zootopia world. They soon came to an atrium with a large circular star symbol recognizable as the symbol of Sardes, before Angie was a massive column with two pillars of Dionysus as a bull holding his urn of wine in one hand and the golden touch in the other tempting Midas. Further in was a stone bridge into the unknown depth of the tomb.
Earl and Logan looked to the unknown darkness with both of them having some eerie feeling come of the both of them. If Logan still ad fur on his body he would have felt it all raise up on his body. "Creepy. This just got a lot more intense." Logan said as he led the way towards the tomb depths.
Earl however shrugged to Logan's comment. "It was already pretty darn intense before. Anubis just blew up some guys back there. You tellin' me you didn't hear the damn explosions?" Earls asked before looking on the walls for some light. Despite being nocturnal the low light still could lead to some issues. "Anyone see a torch?" Earl asked.
"I do. Hands up please don't make this any more difficult." Said Flynn as he aimed his pistol at Earl's head, behind him were the bodyguards of El Capitan and Cloey walking in, they fanned out on both flanks and aimed their more high power automatic weapons at the trio threatening a bloody end if they don't cooperate. "Release your weapons! Ahora you puta! Servants of Pagan Demons like you will be burned at the stakes for the Art of Hell! The fire of damnation shall-" El Capitan once again coughed out and start rolling on the ground in pain, this time Flynn didn't bother helping him but rolled his eyes and came towards Angie still holding his pistol at her face.
"Sorry about that Angie. But really this guy creeps me out as much as he creeps you out. He's just high that's all…" He sheepishly tried to defend himself despite the fact that the Spaniard Conquistador was rambling as if he was still in the 16th century conquest of the Mayans. "Soon! Soon! I will have the Eitr and my ailments will be cured once and for all!" He boasted at the top of his lungs, not completely aware of the irony of his own words. "Really? You're going to enjoy pep drinks from a pagan deity while killing other people and persecute pagan deities?" She sarcastically snarked back at him, prompting him to eye her with a rabid gaze, he grabbed the pistol off of his bodyguard's holster and fired a shot at Earl's stomach without hesitation.
The shot went straight into Earl's stomach, and exited out of the back of him. The bullet was so quick it didn't register as pain until a moment later when Earl finally felt the hot sting of a bullet pierce his flesh and exit his body. Blood from his body sprayed on the wall behind him cold in a moment's notice. Once the pain registered his pupils narrowed and his jaw fell as he fell into shock. "Wh-what?..." was all Earl said before he fell into Logan's shaking arms.
Logan looked down at his uncle with a look of disbelief while Earl fell into Him. logan shook his head not wanting to believe the sight of his uncle Earl wounded before him. "No… N-no.. Earl! Uncle Earl!" Logan shouted while shaking Earl. He looked into Earl's eyes while Earl groaned in pain. "Earl come on stay with me! Come on!" Logan shouted frantically.
"You son of a bitch! How could you do this!? What's the point in throwing a hissy fit!?" Flynn whirred out in shock and outrage at El Capitan's ferocious and unstable nature seeing that he was gladly doing a sadist's work without batting an eye. Flynn saw Angie trying to help hold the bleeding of Earl's stomach while nearly letting out tears, he widened his eyes seeing that truly he had made the worst career choice and even worse was that he helped a complete monster and an immature petulant psychopath to a place of wealth. "Now Puta, put the Paw of Midas on the ground. Ahora! And get in there, find the way to the Eitr. Vamono!" El Capitan shouted at her now his mouth frothed with foams to the point it was unmistakably rabies to everyone.
"Stop it! Stop it! Look I'll find a way to the Eitr just calm the fuck down! Comprendre? Fuck…" Flynn reluctantly walked up to Angie and place a medical bag down to her as an act of offering his apologies to her. "Here Angie, this should help stabilize Earl, I'm going inside with Logan to find the Eitr...or whatever they he wants." Said Flynn, only for her to punch him across his face, he fell down to the floor and sooth his wound by rubbing where she hit him. "Definitely deserved it. Anyway come on Logan…It's better us than me and Angie." Flynn said sheepishly as he began to cross the stone bridge with Logan while Angie stay behind to help Earl plug the bleeding and tend to the wound.
While looking at the bridge Logan shook his head and sniffled. He wiped his snout and his eyes with both his and his arm to clear away tears or anything else that might leaked. His mind now was in a frantic through series while it was all caused by just seeing Earl dying. He glared at Flynn and balled a fist as he was forced to help him. "Well was it it all worth all the gold in the world? Now you have my uncle's blood on your hands." Logan said in a bitter tone as he begrudgingly helped Flynn. "Thanks i guess for the medic bag… The way my luck's been it will only give him ten minutes.." Logan continued as he hammered his rage somewhere where it counted the most.
"Got to be honest with you, I thought that this guy was some weirdos who would rather coup up in his condo or something. Smoking weeds and getting high all that stuff...just didn't realize it was going to be this far. But...are you real or like just a robot or something?" Flynn asked Logan, confused and uncertain on what to say to the wolf that was accompanying him. They first went towards end of the hallway with Flynn's flashlight mounted on his chest looking forward, they saw that in front of them was wall made of gold, with the image of Marigold sculpted on it. When Flynn stroke the sculpted image of the princess, they both heard a ghastly wail from deeper in the tomb echoing to the upper floor.
Whatever the scream was it caused the already frightened Logan to be pushed back by it. He swallowed his breath and looked to Flynn. "I'll answer that later…" Logan said as he looked back to the golden door. Ever since hearing the stories of Midas and the golden touch he was afraid of touching anything made of gold. As such he extended the rail guns from his forearms and pointed them to the golden door ahead of him. "I think we got bigger questions to answer… If you have a better suggestion say it now. Otherwise I can cut through the door I think. I think." Logan as he tried to remember the malleability of gold.
Flynn however soon noticed something on the door, a wooden knob for safe handling, he grabbed the knob with both hooves and rotated it and push the door inward, revealing a staircase leading them down to the burial chamber. On both sides of the stairs, they saw canals for the Eitr, glowing blue resin like substance flowing down to the burial chamber. "Okaaaayyyy. This is getting a bit creepy here." Flynn commented feeling rather cringey as he went down the stairs finding more gold and depictions of Midas's tragedy, his hubris and the punishment the God Dionysus had imposed on him just to teach him a lesson about greed and opulent. They soon found a massive dome like chamber with a pedestal in the middle of it.
On top of the pedestal was the golden mare statue of Marigold, the daughter of Midas and before her was a sarcophagus, Logan and Flynn saw the Greek writing to be "Here lies Midas, in loving memory and tragedies. May his tale be a warning to all."
Around the burial area they found themselves in, they saw a massive pool for the Eitr and Flynn could smell the icy air of the substance. Logan can see with his HUD that the Eitr seem to have some sort of biological, chemical components that reanimated corpses, it seemed like a sort of virus or parasite that once embedded into the host's body will begin to ravage their minds in exchange for breathing in strength and longevity to the body.
Despite its blue and lustrous appearance Logan knew not to even touch the cursed Eitr, or he'd be faced with dire consequences as such. He gagged a bit just by the overpowering other worldly smell of the substance. However, just by examining its function he knew Earl could not be saved with this. It diminished his hopes quickly, and he sighed. "So that's it… It's evil and it will just curse my uncle… That's just great. Hope our captain is happy…" Logan said moving away from the strange liquid.
Of course to Logan and Flynn's chagrin, they heard the same wailing and screaming again, this time they can see where did the ghastly sound come from, it was the golden statue itself. Marigold, the eternally petrified daughter of Midas was still alive somewhat, screaming and standing still in a prison that acted as a monument to the sin and guilt of Midas. "Oh Jesus...I think we've found our sound effect provider." Flynn commented ominously. They were soon joined by El Capitan and his entourage of Bodyguards while the others were staying behind with Angie and Earl to guard them.
"At last...the Eitr is mine…" The weasel quickly ran to the edge of the platform and tried to reach for the substance and cupped his paws together to drink from the pool. As he sipped his first cup of Eitr, he began to cackle and laughing maniacally while rolling on the ground gripping his sore throat. "Que ha pasado? What is happening to me!?" He gasped out seeing that his paws were wrinkling, turning from somewhat healthy and full of flesh to a more corpse like state with the bones being all that's left, skin and fur began to molt and fall off revealing the glowing bones underneath.
It was at that moment, they were introduced to the previous victims of the Eitr, from the pool, ghoulish zombie like creatures jumped up and grabbed onto the platform, slowly crawling up to them. "Uh Logan, anything to say about these?" Flynn shuddered in fear, he stuttered seeing the zombie like mammals like wolves, tigers, lions, deers and so on walking towards them with pale lifeless, glowing eyes.
With the situation quickly going some heartbreaking, to eery, and finally to completely insane Logan's first action was to simply at first action was to back up and use his arm mounted rail guns to blow the heads off of the first few of them. "Yeah. My advise is to FUCKIGN RUN!" Logan shouted while eeping his eye on the captain. He huffed seeing the captain degraded and rot before his very eyes. As horrific as it was and how much he didn't know of him, Logan still huffed out feeling justice was somehow doen as if it were a living entity in the room. "You got what you wanted. Now you can live forever with some freakin' zombie demons." Logan said bitter in his tounge.
"No! No! Don't leave me here, I will pay you an-" El Capitan was cut short when he finally breathed his last feeling life exiting his decaying body while his mercenaries either ran for their lives or being eaten by the Eitr Revenants. Flynn scampered and fell to his stomach while Logan was able to run off as a head start, the equine stood back up trying to make a run for it catching up to Logan. But as he was catching up to Logan, a Revenant jaguar leap up and caught Flynn on his back, forcing him down on the ground stumbling and rolling to throw off the monster. "Help! Logan! Use your...robot...blaster...thing on this thing!" Flynn cried out for help as he struggled to push the Revenant off of him. Logan would fired off a shot at the zombie, he bolt pierced through the thin flesh of zombie and struck the Eitr vein on the ground, to Logan's surprise, it set off an explosion, this soon start a chain reaction with the Eitr began to explode in drove, rocking and bringing down the tomb's inner sanctum.
Logan then ran over to Flynn and hoisted him into the air using his robot strength. It was a very strong pull up into the air that actually caught Flynn by surprise before he got to his feet, but despite his helpfulness Logan still showed his anger by pushing Flynn forwards forcing him to keep his retreat in motion. "Don't just stand around! Run! Don't fall again! Logan demanded sounding frantic as the zombies gave chase behind him and Flynn.
Back at the main room Earl heard the shots of Logan's rail gun in his arm and squinted while still in pain. "L-Logan?... What the god damn hell? Ergh.." Earl coughed up some blood while trying to stand up to his feet only for Cloey to keep him back down. "No. Stay down." Cloey said solemnly. She shook her head out and anxiously looked to the abyss hearing Flynn yelling as well.
"Oh shit...they really hit the shit button now." Said Angie in stark realization as her ears perked up hearing not only the sound of Flynn screaming and yelling but also of Logan's robot arms shooting at the incoming zombie hordes. In the dark tunnel behind the atrium, Anubis emerged with his bow and arrows ready, he waltzed in and fired three arrows at the 3 mercenaries standing in the 3 corners of the room, seizing the opportunity Angie quickly tossed a climbing axe at the throat of the last hired gun in the room.
"We need to leave now!" Anubis commanded sternly as he looked at the wounded and crippled Earl, the deity then went to Earl's side and handed him a brown cloth pouch, it reeks the scent of tea leaves to help relax Earl's mind. "Cloey! Angie! Get out of there now!" Flynn ran towards them just behind Logan. They would see hordes of Revenants running after them and the Undead were coming towards them nearing the bridge in fact, Anubis then slammed his scepter on the ground, summoning a portal, from which, cyan arms of the dead and bony hands tucked away at the Revenant hordes. Anubis's mouth began to glow with him puffing up his chest, he took a step forward and hunched himself forward breathing out the Plague of Locusts blowing through the Revenants.
Logan dived to the ground and held his hand over his head while his rear was high in the air as if he were about to face some kind of explosion. He looked ridiculous, but currently for him it was well needed after being stricken with sadness, anger, fear, and confusion. Most of all though he's seen Anubis's power before and trusted not to go into combat against him besides their first encounter.
Cloey fell to her own rear however seeing the other power Anubis had with him and could only watch silently as the locusts tore up the horde of revants as if they were getting sand blasted with shards of massive glass rather than abrasive sands. She gasped and looked for Flynn in the group after Logan had come through.
Much to Cloey's horror however, Flynn was caught in the midst of the zombie hordes, burdened by their immense strength as they pin him down. Anubis commanded them more sternly to run while the ceiling of the tomb was crashing down on them. "Just go Cloey! There's nothing for us here!" Flynn screamed out. Seeing his selflessness for the first time was a shock for Angie, she had been so familiar with the pompous self indulging manner of him so long that she couldn't believe that he was sacrificing himself to save them. Having no time left to think, she tossed the golden Paw of Midas down to the abyss of the cave knowing that it will be buried there for good.
"I'll see you on the other side soon...you goddamn womanizer." Angie chided him, but not scornfully, but out of mutual respect of the moment before running out of the tomb with Logan and Anubis helping Earl with them. There was no way for them to stop, they had to run, bolt like the lighting out of the collapsing tomb, finally, once they exited the place, the collapsing structure caved in, burying the legacy of Midas's Golden touch and the Eitr once and for all. "Well...one more mystical artifact erased for good. For the better at least." She huffed out and panting exhaustively before looking back at Earl. "How's that wound doing Earl?" She asked as Anubis put him on the ground.
Earl much to their dismay still breathed heavily, and looked to be in absolute pain. He felt the pulsing and throbbing of his wound each time his heart beat it caused his stomach to ache and move back into pain. "Oh god I can feel my whiskey leaking out of me… I feel… I feel sick…" Earl said with nausea in his voice while he looked to his blood soaked shirt. Red gooey liquid poured out of his round and pills onto his clothes quickly becoming cld to the touch. He grabbed his wound with his hand and hold it putting some pressure on it while groaning in more pain. Cloey winced at the sight and felt tears form in her own eyes just by the sher guilt. He consciously berating her for allowing money to get the best of her and following a mad dog leader.
Logan however seemed to be doing the worst and grabbed Earl by both of his shoulders and hoisted him closer to him. As this happened Logan hugged Earl close to him while sobbing pain and anguish. "Come on don't die Uncle Earl.. No… Please! Anubis! Do something! What do I do!?" Logan shouted in a frantic state.
"Calm down. He will not walk the Duat...yet." Anubis calmly replied as he picked up a bottle of healing medicine form his pocket, he rubbed the medicine on his paw in a similar manner to what he did to Angie when they first met at Lycopolis. He then rubbed the ointment paws on Earl's wound, gently letting the potion doing its work. To Earl's amazement, he saw that his blood and flesh was pushing the bullet that pierced his stomach out of him gently, soon the rear of the bullet was protruding out of the entry hole much to Angie's amazement as he then pry the projectile out of his body and tossed to the ground.
"There, Logan, Angie apply pressure here and tie the bandage on the wound to keep it close. Earl will need at least a month till he can finally fly again until then, how about consider having a vacation will you?" Anubis instructed casually to Earl before letting out a soft and light hearted laugh while seeing Angie and Earl tying the bandage on the wound. Once the wound has been tied up, Anubis helped Earl to his feet and let the pilot wolf have a piggyback ride on the jackal's back. Despite not being a robot like Logan, Anubis was still surprisingly strong and physically capable of lifting the mortal up. "Let's go home. Maybe you could consider becoming a Jackal Guards pilot Earl. Interested?"
Earl looked down to Anubis while still awkward about the piggyback ride. Despite this he calmly wrapped his arms around Anubis neck while making a tired groan. "Yeah. Whatever that is. A vacation sounds nice as well… At least he didn't shoot me in the liver or it would have been the end of this wolf's days.. Drinkin' wise." Earl said before laughing. However, he stopped himself from laughing since each time he let out even a small chuckle he felt a surge of pain.
Logan however laughed with glee and joy. He felt metal tear stream out of his synthetic eye ducts. His tears of course looking metallic rather than like normal clear water. He sighed with ashaken breath of air out of his lungs while he looked to Anubis. "Thank you man. Thank you so much…" Logan said while glancing to Anubis.
Cloey however remained in the back with her arms crossed. Too ashamed to look at the rest she looked away from them all. "Whatever I can do to repay you guys I can do it. Should have never been fooled by money, or the promise of. Crazy weasel is dead and burning in hell now." Cloey said bitterly.
"Well at least we're alive and the important part is...we have a tale to tell." Angie said in a rather upbeat tone as they return to the boat for their trip back home to civilization. The sun has set for them on this journey. The night under Thoth's moon will have tales told by the campfire of the Jackal Guards. When Ra's sun rises from the East the next day on Khepri's back and claws, they will have a new adventure to pursue and new discoveries to be made.