Lilith rose from her workstation to his right, and paused to kiss him on that side of his head. As she did so, she tickled just under his chin where his beard always started to grow in fastest, making him smile at the affectionate touch. He returned his attention to his personal document while she crossed behind him to fetch and decorate more miniature marshmallows.
* * *
The pathway emerged onto a sight most wondrous: great crystalline shafts large enough to have formed the pillars of some grand and glorious temple crisscrossed the vast cavern. We walked with wonder, leaping from shaft to perilous shaft, climbing up angled slopes and affixing ropes to assist each other. Our Warlady had communed with the spirit of her Patron God, Chronos the Temporal, and had plotted a path for us to a hidden crevice halfway up one awe-inspiring wall. If we had not had the touch of the Gods blessing our quest, we should never have found the opening.
Not even the greatest and mightiest of ogres could have moved those three shafts even so much as a thumb-width farther apart. Such mischief was our plight, for the opening looked too small to transit. Had they been grown at the hands of faeries? Mischievous sprites of nature, the kind who would take an unholy delight in crafting crystals of gargantuan stature in such a seemingly obstructive position?
Jin, our warband leader, decreed that she, as the smallest if most cunning of our warriors, should go through the opening first, to scout the far side. Should it prove the right one—the error would have been ours if it were not, for our Warlady is rarely ever wrong—then the largest of us would go through next. As I was the only true barbarian born and raised amongst my boon companions, though I had since adopted the others into learning proper barbarian ways, I knew that I would be the one to test the opening’s girth against my resilence and determination. Tall as a tree in height, broad as a mountain in muscles, if I could make it through, the rest of our warband could survive.
I strove with stoic expression to ignore the suggestions made by Maximus—he of a formerly civilized land, and thus uncouth in his jests—that Jin could always stomp on my head and shoulders to dislodge me like a wine cork, should I become lodged in place. My mate, clever and wise, pointed out that he was a reed in shape, and fuzzy-faced enough to serve as a pipe cleaner. If I was the cork for this bottle mouth, she reasoned, then he could be inserted and rubbed back and forth through the opening in the hopes of his facial bristles scouring it wider.
In the span of their jests, Warleader Jin the Monk had stripped her armor and handed most of her precious weapons to her shieldbrother, Kzin. She took with her a simple crossbow for a weapon and wriggled through—
* * *
Lilith dropped three toga-drawn marshmallows into his cocoa, kissed him, and continued drawing more at her desk. Mitch smiled, sipped, and continued.
* * *
—wriggled through the opening. Her efforts were ungraceful at best, but none of us would dare voice a jest at her expense. She had long earned our respect with her leadership, standing tall, if thin. As I peered through the opening in the crystalline lattice, she crawled farther up the passage, stood up—I could see her from calf to hip through the mix of gypsum and rock—then turned back and beckoned to me to join her.
Stripping my armor, and all my weapons but for a knife in my teeth, I attempted to enter the opening. Even my tunic proved problematic, however. Removing it, I angled my shoulders a little more, and with a great shove of my feet and a heave of my arms, I made it through, though the rock stole a sacrifice of red life’s blood from my chest and shoulder. Still, there was leverage when I reached with my arms, and the geomancer’s vice did not hold me more than a few moments at best.
Flush with triumph, I turned around and reached through the opening for my things. Lilith, clever wench, passed through my trusty labrys first, knowing I would rather be bereft of all coverings than be left bereft of any armaments. A barbarian without the means to fight is truly naked, even if he wears a dozen layers of clothes. She is, however, my mate, and insisted I re-don my armor once it, too, was passed through.
I indulged her because we have not yet completed the trials demanded of us by our people, to prove ourselves beyond all doubt in battle before we can have the right to raise the next generation. We must be able to teach them how to survive and thrive in the face of all adversaries, all foes, whether they be of weather, warriorship, or witchcraft. Once these damned Kraken Warriors are defeated, my wench and I will fill the world with our well-earned progeny, and true strength and honor shall rule! Until then, we make do. I helped her dress, and made certain her weapons, like mine, were well-maintained and intact, unharmed by our long journey, while we waited for the rest to come through.
Though they were not as broad-shouldered as me, most of the others in our warband elected to remove their armor and pass it through, too. Franklin, broad-shouldered to a degree, almost needed to remove his shirt as well. I suspect he refused because he knew that after the display of my great muscles and intimidating battle scars, his physique would seem puny by comparison when exposed to the glow of our witch-lights.
Perhaps it was partially out of want to ensure they remembered my thews that I placed my tunic upon the opening we had used, but I knew that on this side of the rock wall, there were several openings that seemed almost of a similar size, but which would be too tight to traverse if we were forced to retreat by the cruel cunning of the Kraken Empire. Picking the wrong opening could leave us vulnerable to being trapped in a slaughter. I could afford the loss of my warband tunic; our Warlady is generous with our pay, so long as we are diligent in not wasting our resources needlessly…
* * *
Lilith cleared her throat, displayed the carefully decorated cylindrical “captives” in her hand, hovered them without releasing any over his cocoa cup… and then gave the workstation screen a pointed look. Rolling his eyes, Mitch went back to writing in the official dry, dull, boring Report form. He input a few more entries, ending with:
* * *
16:45 TS, E Squad encountered the “back door” emergency hatch into the Salik Base. Mission specialist PFC Leonne Prudhomme deployed and applied a pair of SASU-17 to the control panel. As per General Ia’s precognition probability of 72%, the first code which the General gave us functioned adequately, neutralizing surveillance and alarm systems; her coding took only 18 seconds from application of the SASUs to the final command input. The outer airlock-style door unlocked and opened, but only partway due to structural compression from earthquake damage. This left an aperture of 0.17m, insufficient ingress for our squadron.
* * *
A glance at Lilith showed her busy on her own report. Sneaking his cursor over to his document, Mitch continued the tale. The real one, not the boring military-ese version.
* * *
Just a short journey through the crystalline catacombs allowed us to reach the postern gate of the Kraken Fortress. Built in the ancient style of yesteryear, it stood there, still formidable in its cladding of iron and stone, stalwart despite the passing of time. Dust coated its crevices, and no signs of sentries graced its wall. Why should it? To the Kraken mind, no one of anything but the puniest of strength and weakest of skills could have navigated the earthquake-wrought passage to this point. Their hubris would be their undoing, in expecting soft, civilized soldiers to have been picked for a true warrior’s task.
The Lioness, cunning and wise in the ways of witchery, pulled forth the necromantic creations of artifice and artwork. Shaped like a dead Kraken’s tendrils, each talisman bore strange magics that would allow her to cast spells upon the runic magics sealing the portal shut. Our Dark Lady, Warlady and Shaman, had given us scrolls to consult. Should the signs and portends be favorable, by following the first of the spells scribed therein, the portal should open without sign nor sound, our entry guaranteed.
Such work requires craft and cunning, a keen mind and a close attention to detail. Our Warlady, disciple of Chronos, had given us instructions for contingency upon con
tingency… yet when the door of the postern gate unsealed its eldrich wardings and creaked open on the first spell’s try, we could not rejoice. What the God of Time could predict in part, the God of Earthquakes could still counter. The great metal gate lodged less than a hand-span wide, too narrow a gap for even the most slender of our warband.
Silence was our ally. Noise, our foe. To use explosive magics would have announced our presence, and a hundred vicious Kraken soldiers would have descended upon us like carrion beetles, each one determined to bite off chunks of our flesh and chew whilst we screamed. As the others sank into a fierce, if hissed debate, I perceived the door to be only a hand-span thick, and the dip in the ceiling causing the door to move no farther only occurred at one spot.
I had brought my battleaxe, not a mace or a sledgehammer; merely bashing my foes into a pulp would not have delivered a swift enough end to the cunning, treacherous Krakens. Breaking the stone was neither possible, nor quiet enough. But doors, I realized, had hinges… and these hinges were metal. Stretching out my will, I summoned up the power that burned within, the blessing of Ogun, Orisha of Fire, God of Warriors and Crafters, and my personal patron from my Yoruban roots.
Such a gift of fire as I have been granted is not the big flash of an explosion. It is not large, and it is not showy. It is more akin to the slow creep of lava seeping with deadly heat down a mountainside, powerful yet subtle. The pungent scent of burning dust reached my nostrils, pleasing me despite the way it assaulted my senses. Soon, the death of neglect found itself swept aside by the more pleasing scent of the forge, of heated metal waiting for the striking of the hammer. But not to forge a sword into a plowshare like the civilized folks do. No, this was forging a set of door hinges into a way to pry open the door.
My mate scented the smoke, saw my outstretched arm, and exhorted the others to grab the door. With the effort of four, and the protection of their stout gloves, they managed to pull the panel away from its molten metal shackles. Glowing gold dripped onto the floor in its wake, but they shifted the door away from its obstruction and set it aside. Ogun, my patron, granted me the power to extract the heat of holy fire, and within seconds, the edge was safe to touch. But no free passage awaited us. This was a sally port, a barbican with two gates to block the way.
Again, the Lioness progressed, and applied her talisman of Kraken-shaped enchanted hands… and again, the door opened, but only opened partially when by its artifice, she applied the spells to pacify the eldritch powers set to watch in an eternal vigil over this neglected, forgotten entrance. The damage of Tullgrrah, Catman God of Quakes upon the entryway made it necessary to unleash my fury at the delay upon the metal hinges and frame so that the new portal, too, could be forced to give way.
* * *
“That doesn’t look like a dry, boring account,” Lilith said… and ate one of his mini marshmallow men.
“That prisoner was mine to destroy!” Mitch protested.
She continued munching unrepentantly, typing into her report. “I drew it, and… I am done with my report.”
“Good, you can finish mine,” he grunted.
“Absolutely not,” she countered, unmoved.
“I am injured, woman!”
“You can still write.”
“Ruthless wench!”
“Absolutely.” Her fingers touched another of the little caricatures, lifting it to her lips. Placed on the console on the far side from her husband, they were not going to be close enough for him to snatch at the rest, and she clearly knew it. “Better hurry, I only drew ten… whoops, sorry, only eight are left.”
Munch.
Glaring at her, Mitch brooded a few moments in mutiny, then sighed roughly and resumed writing his damned report. He typed in the dry, boring, factual details on how they disabled the surveillance system via a control console inside near the back entrance, looping the vids so that the broadcasts showed nothing but empty, dusty, unused back corridors. Dutifully logged the timestamp for the moment when they heard movement as they progressed through those corridors—17:01 Terran Standard—and how they reached the cavern holding the geothermally powered generators for the whole base at 17:07 TS.
He described how he and a handful of the others silently took up guard positions around the machinery, while Prudhomme, Schwadel, and Nesbit applied their suction-hand devices to the consoles to input General Ia’s codes on how to shut down the generators and lock out the Salik forces from remote reactivation.
* * *
17:12 TS, PSG Willow Thompson, E Delta, hearing movement and what sounded like Sallhash being spoken in the distance, alerted the rest of us on our HUD headsets to make no noise while we stood guard. I continued to peruse the large body of water located behind the main grouping of geothermal ductwork. Sensing that danger was nearby, though I could not xenopathically discern the exact direction, I elected to hold ready my Non-Standard Melee Weapon, specifically my NSMW 506-78, instead of my standard-issue HK-74 laser rifle, under the precognition-authorized assertion of my CO to “…just be yourself while you’re down there, Mitch.”
* * *
“Hmm… that’ll do.” Four miniature marshmallow prisoners plopped into Mitch’s cocoa cup. Four more awaited release. Lilith gave him a pointed look. “Quoting the CO on that particular point almost sounds exciting. Are you sure you want to include it?”
“That is exactly what she told me to do, and I succeeded. If I’d been using my laser rifle, I could’ve shot up some of the equipment and set off an alarm,” he retorted. Deliberately, he shifted his cursor over to his writing. “I wrote several entries in the report, I get to reward myself with the story.”
“Yes, love. For a few minutes,” Lilith replied serenely. And patted one of the remaining four marshmallows with a gentle little squish squish of its cylindrical head. Silently warning him to earn his treat.
By Conan, she’s so… so… Magnificently annoying! Amused, Mitch quickly wrote out what happened next in the story, eager to get to the exciting part.
* * *
…Dread crept through my veins, a prickling of warning, of cold, malicious, rapacious thoughts dragging along my shamanic senses like a wet river weed leaving muddy slime in its wake. Just before they struck, I sensed their intentions and hissed a warning: Through cunning and guile, three Kraken Warrior-Smiths had lurked in the waters, hiding upon hearing our initial approach.
Just as the Lioness and her two companions neutralized the first of the eldritch spell-wardings holding off the hordes of the Catmen Empire, they launched themselves with their mighty, fearsome, monstrously powerful legs out of the water, clearing the pipes drawing earth-energies up out of the bedrock. Ready with my labrys, I lashed out and cleaved through the first and nearest of the descending monsters’ limbs. Gore splattered and blood flowed profusely, but mine was not the only debilitating blow.
My mate, swift in reflex and sure of aim, flung her dagger straight into the skull of a descending Kraken, impaling its wits even as she rolled out of its way. Sure in my faith that she could and would kill her foe, I finished my swing with a spin, slamming the bit of my battleaxe into the brains of my enemy—only to be grappled by the slimy squid-like tentacles of the third Kraken warrior. With a heaving grasp, he crushed my ribs, attempting to paralyze me so he could bite off a chunk of my flesh, in the foul manner of his kind.
Grimacing in pain, I cracked my head back against his mouth, breaking his teeth at the expense of stars exploding across my vision. Releasing one hand from my labrys, I reached up and back, grasped the eyestalk of the beast-man, and proved my strength was more than equal to his by crushing one eye, rendering him blind. With a mouthful of my hair, the beast could not roar loudly; with a stab of her other knife, my mate slaughtered the Kraken, robbing his life before he could devour mine.
He slumped against me, paining me from the pressure on my broken ribs. Some of the suckers ripped free, leaving welts that perhaps shall scar, testament to my surviving the attack of the cannibal Krak
en. With aid from my companions, I peeled off the rest, and expressed my rage by decapitating all three—a task well-suited to the swinging of a labrys, and never to be underestimated in the hands of one as well-trained as I in the art of the battleaxe.
Coated in the gore of my enemies, their blood splashed across my body and drenching the floor, I stood guard while Willow, the Tree-Witch, applied her medical magics to my frame and wrapped my ribs with bandaging to ensure the broken ends would not shift should battle occur again. The sounds of our combat had not been loud enough to draw the rest of the stronghold’s warriors, so when the last of the eldritch counterspelling had been chanted and drawn upon the mystical artifacts, I was able to move with the rest of the warband out of the cavern and back to our base camp beyond the doors I had melted free of the earth’s grip…
* * *
“More Action Report, dear,” his mate reminded him.
He reached for his cup, sipped, and made a face. “My cocoa is getting cold.”
“Write faster. I’ll even make you a fresh one if you finish the report in the next ten minutes,” she added. “And I’ll throw in some Kraken marshmallows, this time.”
The irony of “eating” Salik-decorated marshmallows, when that race literally wanted to eat humans alive, appealed to him. Focusing through the dull ache of his ribs and the faint throbbing of his head, he finished the report, ending with the last few timestamped moments worth mentioning, and gave the shortest answers possible in the analysis fields.
* * *
19:44 TS, The 3rd Platoon of “Clan Calygos,” the TUPSF-SF 19th Cord. 6th Div. 4th Batt. 1st Brig. 2nd Leg., B Company, reached our position. Corporal Bottomley exchanged the pre-designated sign-and-countersign confirming our respective identities.
19:49 TS, 3rd Platoon of Clan Calygos Company extracted E Squad, 2nd Platoon of Ia’s Damned out through the front door. I expressed my relief and gratitude at not having to contort my broken ribs through any small apertures. We then headed out under vehicular escort to our extraction point. There were no further incidents to report during our entire retreat.
Infinite Stars Page 40