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Gehenna, Year 1,007
The last three weeks had been the most grueling they could remember. Whoever or whatever was tormenting them was done pulling punches. The hordes lasted longer each day, there were fewer breaks between them, and there were more beasts in each mob. Bruce and Diana's injuries were building, bruises covering much of their bodies. They were falling behind on upkeep chores and becoming sleep deprived. There was no doubt that they were pulling muscles, overexerting themselves. Their days were becoming indistinguishable from the nightmares they were now having every night. Gehenna had earned its name, and with their memories constantly threatening to fail, they might as well have been there for eternity.
Bruce and Diana's reason for fighting the endless war had long escaped them, leaving behind only the feeling of existential dread at the very thought of giving up. Near the beginning of their hellish sentence, the days had started to blur together, then the weeks, then months, now years and even decades were meaningless to them. Time had no meaning, nothing did; nothing but sin and death. But what were once amorphous concepts, now stood before them every day, corporeal.
They trudged the distance to the battlefield, dragging their feet along with them. When they got there, they made the necessary preparations on the veritable fortress of a landscape they had constructed over the years.
Bruce nodded toward the West as a group of the beasts crested a hill. "Ready?"
The two warriors got into position, feeling the lethargy compound as the horde got closer. A few traps went off, killing a dozen or so of the creatures, not enough in their opinions. The horde grew closer and more fell to the traps.
Diana and Bruce had opted to not construct an actual building because it limited movement and oftentimes their victories came down to their greater agility. A building could wind up trapping them and that risk was not worth the potential ease of defending walls. Instead they had decided to create a maze of easily resettable traps that often dealt with the first wave of creatures. Just like a spider's web, only one with knowledge of the layout could move freely. Thankfully, the monsters were far too stupid to learn the layout, or even take their time trying to find a safe path.
Bruce could feel his hands slipping down his spear as he leaned on it watching the beasts mindlessly walk straight into pits, get stuck in adhesives, and impaled by spring-loaded spikes. Diana could feel the sins the monsters represented escaping as they died. A few were getting close, so they picked themselves up and lifted their heavy shields. They steeled themselves for what was to come and by the time the horde reached them, the two who had previously seemed at the end of their rope, were seemingly revitalized. Even in this exhausted state, strength and determination coursed through their veins.
However, their energy was only a façade, a thin cover of fortitude over minds, bodies, and spirits that had endured too much. It was not long before one of them collapsed for the first time that day.
Diana stretched out her arm. "Together?"
Bruce took it and pulled himself up. "Together."
They took turns falling to their knees and offering a hand back up with a simple reassurance for hours. They wavered, but did not falter. They bent, but they did not break. They were cut and bruised, but they were not slain. The once strange, but now too familiar sun, crawled across the sky; mocking them with its leisurely pace. In the early afternoon, Bruce helped Diana up as he slew what to their great surprise was the last visible beast in the area. Never before had the horde ceased this early in the day. There were usually breaks, but they could always see more in the distance.
"Any idea what's going on?" Diana looked at Bruce, her voice betraying her suspicion of the situation.
"No idea, but let's take this opportunity to reset what traps we can and finish off any incapacitated ones. I don't trust that this is the end."
They moved about their web, breaking necks, stabbing hearts, and resetting any trap that was not made inert by the bodies of the dead.
"Bruce!" Diana shouted from the other side of the field.
Bruce looked up from the rope trigger he was setting and squinted at Diana who was about a football field away. She was pointing toward the West, where the hordes usually came from. At first he did not see what she was pointing at, but then he noticed that an entire hill was shifting. He ran the paths he had long since memorized to the other side of the battlefield. He stood next to Diana and placed his hand on her shoulder, confirming that he saw it too.
A horde larger than they had ever seen was marching in unison, almost like an army, over the hill and straight toward them. Diana sank to her knees as the ground shook with the hundreds of footsteps. Bruce followed suit, placing his arm around her.
Tears welled up in Diana's eyes. "I don't think I can do it, Bruce. It's too much. All this fighting. All of our weaknesses and failures. What have we accomplished? Have we actually done anything?"
Bruce did not know how to answer. The ground shook more furiously and darkness filled their minds. They pulled each other closer, asking each other with their body language if they were finally giving up. Then a spark briefly illuminated the darkness in their minds. A faint memory took hold of Bruce's mind. A vision of an alley, of a monster and tragedy. The memory was fleeting, but the anger stayed with him, it exploded into a raging fire, illuminating the darkness.
For Diana it was just a feeling; a feeling of anguish at the thought of allowing the forces before her to triumph. Why the anguish though, she thought. The answer came to her when she looked at Bruce. There was love beneath the anguish, but not just for him, for others too. There are others, I remember that much.
They stood, righteous anger fueling them. Anger born out of pain; pain born out of love. A man stood before them, clothed in white. The hundreds of beasts stood noiselessly behind him. In their confusion, Bruce and Diana froze with spears raised, staring at this anomaly.
Before they could discern his intentions, he spoke: "Diana. Bruce. My children. Why do you continue to fight? Lay down your arms and I will give you rest."
"Who are you?" Bruce asked. Him and Diana did not lower their guards.
"Do you need even ask? I am your God. The God of Zeus and Hera. The God of Abraham and Mohammad. The God of Odin and Freya. Of Vishnu and Krishna. Of Bondye and Papa Legba. Of Amun-Ra and Anubis." As the man spoke he levitated off the ground slightly, raised his arms forward, and looked down at them.
Bruce and Diana looked at each other with looks of absolute bewilderment on their faces, still refusing to lower their guards.
The man sunk back to the ground and lowered his arms. "Diana, look here." He pointed to his left.
In the middle of the air where he pointed, a small window opened to another world. Through the window they could see a beautiful island. Blue waves broke upon the golden beaches. Marble buildings dotted the landscape with a small town near the top of the highest hill. A great palace and temple crowned it all, making the Parthenon look like an imitation. Diana suddenly remembered her home and all her sisters. Her heart could not bear the longing she felt, not only for the island and her sisters, but for her memories as well.
"Bruce, look here." The man pointed to his right.
Another window opened. This one showed what had never been, a young man giving a presentation at a business meeting with his father looking on approvingly. Then it switched to a mother, a father, and their butler being introduced to a woman who looked very much like Diana by their son. They were having a wonderful dinner, laughing and smiling.
The two war-weary heroes managed to tear their eyes away from the scenes and glare at the man in front of them.
"Why would you torment us with that which we cannot have?!" Diana was seething.
The man shook his head. "I am merely showing you what I can give you if you lay down your arms."
Diana and Bruce both felt like their hearts were already in those other worlds. They could not help but look again, and the windows trapped their eyes along with their hearts, they could not look away again. Their feet carried them toward their respective windows. As they walked their arms fell off each other's shoulders and their hands clasped each other. Just before they reached the windows a force stopped them. They pulled against the force that was holding them back, but it would not budge. Their eyes were suddenly free to find the source of the force. Upon looking they realized they had been pulling against each other. They would have to let go in order to reach the windows.
They hesitated, looking at their linked fingers. The hesitation was enough for their conscious minds to push back against the temptation. They looked in each other's eyes and nodded. Their legs shook as they pulled each other back from the brink and backed away from the windows and the man.
Bruce spoke first. "Why do we need to lay down our arms for you to give us those things? Why would you want us to give up when you clearly have control over the hordes? Why did you let us fight for so long in the first place?"
A flash of anger crossed the man's face, he hid it quickly, but it was too late. Bruce and Diana saw it; their shields interlinked and their spears were readied.
"I do not need to concern myself with your impertinence. If you wish to continue fighting, so be it." The man vanished and the horde became mindless once again.
"Fuuuck." The warriors of Gehenna whispered it under their breath as hundreds ran toward them.
They broke into a run as well, leading the horde across their web. They were on the other side of it in surprisingly little time and when they turned to fight the horde. They saw just how few of their traps they had been able to reset. It was taking far longer for the creatures going through the web to progress than it was for the beasts who were on the extreme ends of the horde who just went around it. So, the two ends of the horde curved around the web, and reached them first.
"You take the right, I'll take the left." Bruce said, and charged at the crescent of creatures coming from the left.
The fighting was not too bad at first, everytime they were about to be surrounded, they just took a step back. However, this strategy soon had them standing abreast again with only a few dozen monsters slain. They continued to step back, but their backward pace was quickening and constantly being on the back foot made it difficult to fight. They watched in horror as they became more and more surrounded. More mistakes were made, more wounds incurred.
A monster swung at Bruce, there was nowhere to dodge to, so he intercepted the blow with his shield. He heard a sickening crack and then felt a searing pain shoot up his arm. He refused to cry out lest he worry Diana. He ground his teeth fighting back the pain as he slew the monster. Diana was not faring any better, she had received a blow to the head that now had her vision swimming. It was like fighting drunk.
Diana noticed that Bruce's shield arm had gone limp, so when she saw a monster to her right side thrust at Bruce, she spun around catching the thrust on her own shield. But her balance was off due to her visual impairment so she fell backwards into Bruce and knocked them both over. She dropped her spear and braced her shield with both arms, covering both of their top halves to the best of her ability as blows rained down on them. Bruce continued to hack at anything nearby with his sword, but was seriously hindered by having to stay under Diana's shield. Their exposed legs were swiftly broken and mutilated by various weapons.
The clang of metal and the searing pain left no room for words even much in the way of thoughts. The sky grew unbearably bright and the blows stopped leaving them to moan and faint from the pain. Just as they fell unconscious, a horn sounded nearby.