"It looks like . . ." Riff whispered.
"Like Earth's Ancient Egypt." Giga nodded. "The Egypt you're familiar with, sir, was founded by ancient astronauts from planet Athemes. Aliens from here traveled to Earth fifteen thousand years ago on magnificent ships—great clockwork galleys built of wood, complete with oars and sails, that floated across space. They crashed onto Egypt, where the local humans worshipped them as gods and built great cities, modeled after the cities of Athemes."
Riff tilted his head. "Giga! Egypt—founded by ancient aliens? You sound like one of those conspiracy theorists from cyberspace."
"But it's true, sir!" Giga nodded. "You know the gods from Egyptian mythology—Anubis with the head of a jackal, Horus with the falcon head, and so on? All aliens from Athemes. It's quite sad, really." Giga lowered her head. "The Athemians have since lost the ability to space travel. Once humans worshipped them. Today they worship humans."
Riff wasn't sure he believed any of it. Ancient Egypt's gods—aliens? It sounded like a bad TV show.
"Just find the prison and land us by it," he said.
"Happy to comply!"
As the ship glided down, the door creaked open behind them, and Lenora stepped onto the bridge. She had washed her woolen vest and skirt, and she had braided her brown hair. Her glasses perched upon her nose, magnifying her hazel eyes. The bloody, bruised survivor was gone, yet more fear than ever seemed to fill Lenora. Her cheeks were pale, her lips tight, and her fingers clutched at her skirt.
"I can see it below," Lenora whispered. "My father's prison. The place where my brother languishes."
He looked at her. "You said your father can be reasoned with. That he'll let us speak to Dee. Yet you seem nervous."
She gulped. "My father . . . has always been strict. He treated our own house like a prison, himself the warden. The Knights of Sol taught him harsh discipline, unforgiving justice. If you think Steel hard, you ain't seen nothing." She shuddered. "It's funny. I'm halfway through my thirties, Riff. As old as he was when I was a child. Yet I'm still scared of him."
Riff thought about his own father, the traveling magician, crazy old Aminor. He wondered where the old man was now. He missed him. Aminor was always off on some mysterious quest saving the galaxy . . . somehow always leaving Riff to fight his own cosmic threats.
I miss you, Dad, he thought.
"Which building is your father's prison?" Riff asked.
Lenora pointed. "The tall pyramid with the cap of iron."
"Taking us there, ma'am!" said Giga.
Soon the Dragon Huntress was gliding directly over a lush, sprawling city. Ziggurats rose here, coiling buildings of sandstone, their facades painted with hieroglyphs. Columned temples rose among them, their staircases lined with statues of men with heads of jackals, hawks, and hippopotamuses. Obelisks rose from cobbled squares, their tips capped with platinum. Everywhere swayed palm trees, fig trees, and rushes. The river flowed through the city, and on it sailed countless ships, their sails white, their decks overflowing with baskets of fish, perfumes, exotic birds in cages, and gleaming gemstones.
Past swaying rushes, vineyards, and palm groves spread the desert. As lush as the riverbanks were, the desert was barren. The dunes rolled into the horizons, and yellow mountains rose in the distance toward a pale sky. The pyramids of Athemes rose from the desert, a kilometer high, dwarfing any pyramid back on Earth. Six among them were polished to a sheen, and gold capped their tips. The seventh, farther back, was built of craggy bricks, and its tip was forged of dark iron.
"There it is." Lenora pointed. "The last pyramid. The Holy Knights of Sol Asylum. My father's prison for the insane."
Giga nodded. "The Knights of Sol first came here from Earth a thousand years ago. They hired the tawerets, an endemic race of aliens with hippopotamus heads, to construct the most complex prison they could. The knights imprison most of their enemies on the moons of Jupiter, but some enemies—the most ruthless, psychotic ones—are deemed too dangerous to be held within our solar system. Those ones are brought here. The tawerets believe the Knights of Sol to be sky gods, their prisoners to be demons of the underworld. Of course, the knights are only humans, but in the ancient Scroll of Taweret Mah, it is written that—"
"Thank you, Gig." Riff patted her shoulder. "Remember, less infodump. Just give us snippets of information on the fly. Can you land us by the prison?"
Giga smiled. "Happy to comply!"
The Dragon Huntress's thruster engines roared, and the ship slowed to a hover, then clanked down in the sand outside the towering, craggy pyramid. Palm trees bent. Camels fled. With a puff of smoke and a rattle, the engines turned off.
The door creaked open, and Romy stepped onto the bridge. The demon was dressed as an ancient pharaoh, complete with a snake tiara, and an Eye of Ra pendant hung around her neck. She held out her arms like an Egyptian.
"It is I, Pharaoh Romy!" she announced. "I'm ready to enter my domain."
"I hope you mean the ship's attic," Riff said. "Cuz that's where you're staying."
Romy moaned, tossed off her snake tiara, and grabbed a bullwhip and fedora. "Can I go as an archaeologist?"
"No! Attic."
"A mummy?" She began wrapping herself with toilet paper.
"Attic!"
The demon whined and stormed off, mumbling about how Riff was going to get hit with an ancient curse, and she was not going to be there to save him.
Riff turned back toward Lenora. "I'll let you do the talking. Whatever happens, I'm here with you. And so is my crew."
I only wish you were here with us, Nova and Twig, Riff thought.
Lenora kissed his cheek. "Thank you."
They left the bridge and stepped onto the main deck. The scientists rescued from Kaperosa still crowded here. Steel stood among them, clad in his full plate armor. The old sigil on his breastplate, the sun of Sol, had been scratched off; a badge with the words "Alien Hunters" appeared there instead. The knight's face was hard and cold.
"All right, Steel?" Riff said, approaching his brother. He knew what this meant to the knight. Here, in this pyramid, waited the lord who had knighted him . . . then banished him.
"I am ready," Steel said, chin raised, but Riff saw the ghosts in his eyes. "Always."
Lenora wrapped her arms around Steel and leaned against him. Riff turned toward the airlock and opened the door. The light and heat of the planet Athemes flowed in, hitting them like a wave. Riff stepped out onto the sand of a new world.
* * * * *
Steel stood in the sand, staring ahead at The Holy Knights of Sol Asylum.
The pyramid loomed above him, a kilometer high. Each of its bricks was the size of the Dragon Huntress, craggy, roughly hewn by alien hands. The triangle soared toward a tip coated with iron. An engraving of an eye shone there, reflecting the sunlight, glaring at the desert, the river, and Steel. He narrowed his eyes, staring back.
"You cast me aside, Lord Kerish," he said softly. "As you cast aside your daughter. But we're back. You will not cast me aside so easily again."
Steel spoke to himself alone, yet Lenora seemed to hear him. She slipped her small, pale hand into his large, callused one. He looked at her, and she gazed back with soft eyes. In them, he saw the same love that had shone years ago. The same eyes he used to spend hours gazing into.
"We need not fear him," she said.
Steel nodded and returned his eyes to the pyramid. "And we do not."
Yet both were lying, Steel knew. They did need to fear Lord Kerish Rosetta. Lenora's father ranked high among the Knights of Sol, a close companion to the Supreme Leader who reigned on Earth. While the Supreme Leader mostly concerned himself with prayer and ceremony, it was Lord Rosetta who meted out the Knights' justice. He was judge, jury, and executioner of this ancient knightly order, ruling not only sworn knights . . . but the knighthood's enemies.
A man who committed his own son to prison, Steel thought. A man who once considered me a son as well.
&nb
sp; "Camel ride, sir? Ma'am? Camel ride?" A camel lolloped forth, bearing a tasseled saddle.
Steel narrowed his eyes, searching for a camel handler. Then he realized the camel himself had spoken.
"Ride for two credits, sirs!" the animal said.
Steel shook his head. "We're heading to the prison. That's only a hundred meters away. We can walk."
The camel turned to look at Giga, bells jangling across his saddlebags. "Ride for the android? Sand is very dangerous for androids, ma'am. Gets between your parts. Ride for two credits?"
Giga looked at Riff. The captain nodded, reached into his jeans pocket, and pulled out a couple coins. He slipped them into the camel's saddlebag, and the animal knelt in the sand. Giga climbed into the saddle.
"Thank you, sirs!" the camel said. "Are you sure you'd like to go straight to the Holy Knights of Sol Asylum? For only twenty credits, I'd be glad to serve as your tour guide. I can show you the Leaning Obelisk of Mareka, visit the Halls of Ghosts in the Temple of Ra, and stroll along the Ereef River where you can see the cranes and ibises. Perhaps even a moonlit walk through the City of the Dead, and—"
"Just to the pyramid, please," Steel said.
The camel tightened his lips, raised his head, and began to trot toward the pyramid. Giga, clad in a white kimono embroidered with palm trees, bounced upon his hump.
Steel, Riff, and Lenora walked alongside.
"Talking camels!" Lenora whispered. "Are your adventures always so strange?"
Riff sighed. "I thought the talking camel was normal. Does that answer your question?"
They reached the base of the pyramid, and Giga dismounted. A staircase stretched up the craggy facade toward a stone archway a few hundred meters above.
"Care to ride me upstairs?" the camel said. "I can carry you one by one. Only three credits per stair climb. Perhaps afterward, you would like to visit the mystical Alley of Serpents in the city, or see the exotic belly dancers of Keetan, then perhaps taste the delight of Happy Cow's Shawarma at the city docks."
"You have Happy Cow Shawarma here too?" Riff asked. It was their favorite take-out place, its franchises popping up on planets, moons, asteroids, and space stations across the galaxy.
"But of course, sir! There is a Happy Cow Shawarma everywhere." The camel lowered his head. "I lost some good friends there, I can tell you."
Riff shuddered. "I think we'll pass. On everything. Thank you, camel."
The camel looked as if Riff had just told him he only rode llamas. The animal raised his nose, spun around, and trotted away.
Leaving the dunes below, they began to climb the stairs—a space captain in torn jeans, an outcast knight in dented armor, an android with a katana across her back, and a scientist nervously clutching her woolen skirt. Steel doubted that anyone stranger had ever climbed these stairs.
He glanced behind him once. In the distance, Steel could see the palm trees, obelisks, and ziggurats of the city, and beyond them white sails flowing across the river. Suddenly Steel wished they could have taken the camel up on his offer, could spend the day exploring the wonders of this ancient civilization. Yet Steel turned his eyes back forward. He would not abandon his task. The shades swarmed across the cosmos, toppling the cities of Earth. Perhaps he had been banished from his order, but Steel Starfire had still taken a vow—a vow to always live a life of honor, to defend those in need, to fight ever onward.
I swore that vow to the man I now climb to see.
Hundreds of steps up, when they were all wheezing—aside from Giga—they reached the gateway into the pyramid. Hieroglyphs of hawks, serpents, and eyes were engraved onto its stones, and golden statues of jackals stood at its sides. Before the doorway stood the gatekeepers: two burly aliens with the bodies of men and the heads of hippopotamuses. They wore white loincloths, and golden rings encircled their massive, swordlike teeth. With their plump hands, they gripped spears.
"Tawerets," Giga whispered, turning toward her companions. "Native life forms of the planet Athemes. The tawerets believe that they were sired twenty thousand years ago, during a romantic encounter between the Sky Goddess Isanish and the river god Heras, a hippopotamus thought to have created the river by shedding his tears. The tawerets' average lifespan is fifty years, and they reach sexual maturity at fifteen. Their dental formula is—"
"Thank you, Giga," Riff said. "Nice on the fly information there."
She grinned. "Happy to comply, sir!"
The tawerets slammed down the butts of their spears. The aliens stood seven feet tall, and their jaws seemed wide enough to swallow men whole.
"Who comes to the Holy Knights of Sol Asylum?" one rumbled, voice like boulders slamming together.
Lenora stepped forth. "It is I, Lenora Rosetta, daughter of Lord Kerish Rosetta. With me are Riff Starfire, captain of the HMS Dragon Huntress, and Giga, his loyal companion. With us too is Steel Starfire, a knight of—"
"He is no knight," rumbled the second taweret. The great hippopotamus jaws opened wide, revealing teeth like meat cleavers. "We know of Steel the Heretic. Our tales tell of him, the rogue whom our lord banished."
Steel forced himself to remain calm. He stared at the towering aliens. They were taller than him, wider, stronger, but his strength came from deep within, from a faith that no banishment could shatter.
"I was banished," he said. "Yet I still took the vows of knighthood, and I still have honor in my heart. You will step aside. You will not turn back the daughter of your lord."
The tawerets raised their spears. "The heretic dares speak! We will slay you. For the glory of the Knights of Sol, our gods, we will—"
"If the knights are your gods, then I am your goddess!" said Lenora. Her cheeks flushed, and her chest heaved. She stepped even closer. "Step aside. Do it now, or my father will hear that you attacked his only daughter. Stand back!"
The two hippopotamus heads swiveled on their necks. As large and beefy as the aliens' humanoid bodies were—and those bodies put most wrestlers to shame—the heads were almost comically large. Their jaws snapped shut, and their eyes narrowed. Finally the tawerets nodded, stepped aside, and knelt.
"Enter, visitors, to the depths of shadow and secrets. Enter our dark world, and may the haunting terrors within spare your souls."
"So . . . sort of like entering the bathroom after Piston used it," Riff whispered. Steel did not even crack a smile. They entered the shadows together.
A hall loomed before them. The walls, floor, and ceiling were carved of polished bricks, and embers glowed in iron braziers. Murals covered the walls, depicting the Ereef river, its water full of sailing ships and crocodiles, its banks lined with rushes. Upon the ceiling sprawled a fresco of knightly starships descending from the sun, as tawerets knelt among rushes, worshiping the alien visitors. Real, living tawerets stood along the walls, spears and shields in their hands, their hippopotamus eyes staring with suspicion as the companions walked by.
The hall led them toward a balcony overlooking a vast round chamber. The place was so large the Dragon Huntress could have flown loops here without grazing the walls.
"The prisoners," Riff whispered, pausing on the balcony.
Steel stared down with hard eyes. "The justice of Lord Kerish Rosetta."
Lenora covered her eyes and turned her head away. Only Giga seemed undisturbed; the android stared with fascination.
"I count four thousand, three hundred and twelve prison cells, sir," she whispered to Riff, wonder in her voice. "Of course, you might want to count the Two-Headed Vegan Swamp Reptiles as two prisoners, in which case, you should add twelve to the count." Her eyes widened. "Look, sir! Do you see the big slimy green one in the back? That's Boss Ruko himself, notorious godfather of the Gerisha crime family of Betelgeuse, while—"
"Thank you, Giga," Riff whispered, voice weak. "I think I know enough."
Steel stared into the spherical chamber. Thousands of cells lined its walls, twenty stories tall, lined with bars. The prisoners languished within—humans
and aliens of all kinds. Some wore straitjackets. Others were chained to the walls. A few were unrestrained and hopped around madly, cackling. One alien, a purple thing with many eye stalks, was banging a mug against the bars. Another prisoner, a young woman with pink hair, dangled her legs between the bars while playing a harmonica.
"Where's Dee?" Lenora whispered. "Where's my brother?"
"These are only the low-security prisoners, ma'am," Giga said, turning toward Lenora. "The most dangerous criminals are kept far below this place, buried past many guardians." The android lowered her head. "Forgive me, ma'am, but Dee Rosetta has been classified as a Priority One prisoner. He's been locked in solitary confinement for the past few years. Did you know that the average prisoner in The Holy Asylum only keeps his sanity for two hundred and seventeen days in solitary confinement? You see, the dungeons are designed to—"
Riff placed a finger against her lips. "Giga, no more information even on the fly, all right?"
She nodded, smiling sweetly. "Happy to comply!"
Two prison guards approached. These ones were shorter and slimmer than the guards outside. They had the bodies of women, clad in white and gold muslin, and jackal heads with shining black eyes. Wavy daggers hung at their sides.
"We're here to see my father, Lord Kerish Rosetta," Lenora said. She repeated her little speech from the gateway.
The jackal-headed guards nodded. They spoke in soft, feminine voices. "Come with us, daughter of our lord."
The jackals took them through a small, shadowy archway and up a winding staircase. They climbed past many prison cells. In one, a group of rough-looking gruffles hooted and jeered. In another, what looked like a living tree was struggling to break the bars with his roots. In a third cell, a shapeshifter leered, turning into Riff, then Steel, and finally Giga, taunting them all the while with mad laughter.
Finally the Alien Hunters reached a towering stone doorway. More hippo-heads stood here, these ones armed with mean-looking guns. The brutes shuffled aside, allowing Lenora, Giga, and the Starfire brothers to enter a chamber.
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