Authors: Dhayaa Anbajagane
The general slumped in his chair, his eyes blank, “The H.U.L.K,” he said.
“What’s the H.U.L.K?” Q asked. To him it seemed weird, and cool, to have a bomb named after a super hero, especially one that could go berserk whenever he wanted to.
“It’s an energy bomb that can wipe out half a planet,” Carlos said.
Wow
, he thought.
So much for superhero
.
“Wait so they need a ton of energy for that bomb to work?” Q asked.
“A ton is an understatement, my boy. That bomb would require energy that was on the order of that emitted by the stars.”
“Couldn’t they convert matter to energy and use that?”
“Of course. In fact that’d be the most practical way.”
“Don’t you see?” Q said. “They’re getting you to do their dirty work for them. The Thanonians wipe out the cities. They dig underneath those rural lands and use all that matter in the bomb.”
Za’ad seemed stunned, “It makes sense. The Getafixians cherish their planet’s forests for all those medicinal herbs, so there’s no way they’d touch those. The urban areas are out of the question which means they’re left with just the rural lands in the minor cities.”
“You’ve been helping them beat you all along,” Carlos said.
“Oh god,” the General sunk his head to the table. He’d just led a scheme that was actually going to take apart his planet. Well, a good part of it.
“Call in all squad commanders,” he said.
Carlos nodded and stood up.
“
Request confirmed,
” a female mechanical voice said. “
Calling all commanders
.”
“I didn’t mean you, Commander,” the General said.
“Oh,” Carlos said, and sat down, trying hard to hide his embarrassed face.
“Engage the black room,” Za’ad said. “Disable all data tracking. Lockdown room security.”
“
Acknowledged
.”
The wall opened up and ten men walked in, each one with a full piece of armor minus the helmet. They all had the same elven face shapes with different shades of eyes, different body structures, but shared the same ears, and interestingly, the exact same shade of jet black hair.
Maybe all Thanonians have black hair
, Q thought.
Or maybe they all wear wigs
.
As soon as the men walked in, the room started to tremor a bit. The white room became a dark shade of black, illuminated only by a grid of lights that had appeared on the ceiling. The desk sunk into the floor and the chairs shifted around the room. The floor rumbled as a large section of it slid open allowing a table to rise up. Q, Carlos and the General’s chairs shifted into position around the table, and another ten chairs popped up for the Commanders to take their seats as well.
The wall behind them closed just as they all sat down, “
Lockdown complete
,” the voice said. “
Black room engaged.
”
“Gentlemen,” the General looked at all his Squad Commanders. “We’re in a bit of trouble.”
All of them looked completely calm and composed as though they were seasoned to such situations.
“Commander Carlos has provided us with intel about Armorica’s next-gen weapon. The H.U.L.K.”
Every commanders’ eyes widened.
So much for calm and composed
, Q thought.
General Za’ad spent the next fifteen minutes briefing them all about the situation, how the Getafixians were planning to convert land matter into energy that could fuel the bomb.
The Commanders instantly agreed that they had to stop their warships from attacking the rural Armorican cities, but they were all stymied by one problem.
“What do we do about Prince Ryul’s situation?” General Za’ad asked. “We know that he is in Nakiri. But that’s as far as it gets.”
“Ummm,” one of the commanders raised his hand. “Forgive me if I am out of line, sir, but I believe the problem will be taken care of soon.”
“What is it Seyfried?” The General raised an eyebrow.
“When my battalion sent the warship down toward the capitol, I arranged for a small escape vessel to be dispatched towards the Vlar Mountains. That point is the easiest to make the jump from our world into Nakiri.”
“Oh god,” Q said.
“What happened boy?” Commander Seyfried asked.
“The Getafixians, they know about your escape carrier,” he said. “High Priest Idhren told us they’d detected it.”
General Za’ad cursed, “This worsens the situation then,” he said. “The rescue squad will definitely be caught, and that means we do not know what will happen to our Prince.”
Everyone sat in silence.
“Commander Seyfried,” the General said.
“Yes, General Za’ad,” he said.
“You are hereby relieved of duty until the end of this mission. Please see yourself out the door.”
The man looked stunned for a second, his gray eyes showing a hint of sadness in them. The wall split open, and a beam of light shone in from the outside.
“Yes sir,” he said, in a low voice and walked out. The wall closed after him, leaving the room in silence.
“If anyone else has attempted missions like these you better tell me here and now, else temporarily relieving you of duty won’t be the only thing that I’ll do.”
No one spoke up.
“Very well then,” he said. “In light of the new situation, we will have to assume our Prince’s life is at stake. We have nothing left to lose now. Order all warships to maintain position over their assigned cities, but tell them all to disable their main cannons. We have two warships that we sent as a backup option in case one of any failures. Get those ships to fly over Idhren’s castle. We need to raze it to the ground.”
“General?” Carlos raised an eyebrow.
“Ah, I got ahead of myself. I apologize,” he said. “We shall use the two ships to issue a warning in case Prince Ryul’s rescue operation does not go as planned.”
“Sir, who should we assign to the rescue operation?”
“You’re looking at them,” the General grinned at Q and Carlos.
Q waved his hand. “Umm, hi.”
“Do any of you have any problems with this?” he asked.
The General seemed to be giving them the option, but deep beneath it all Q could tell the commanders were forced to accept the decision. That’s the sort of poise and authority Za’ad held over everyone else.
“No sir,” they all said together.
“General Za’ad, just one last thing,” Carlos said. “The main castle is shielded by an invisible force field.”
“Invisible?” he seemed surprised. “Idhren, that cunning fox. We’re going to have to set up a force field destabilizer.”
“That won’t help. Idhren only told me half the truth. The reality is that there are two force fields overlapping the castle one over the other. They’re so close together they’re treated as one. Regular force field cancellation tactics won’t work. We’ll have to hack into the server and shut both of them down.”
“That poses a problem,” General said sighed. “You would have to be inside the castle to be able to tap into their security.”
“I’ve been in it once already. I can get into again from anywhere you want. Just load the ship up with a proper communications system and I’ll hack into that server before we reach the castle.”
“Very well then,” he stood up. “Gentlemen, I want each of you to report to me with a completed checklist in the next fifteen minutes.”
The wall split open again.
“Yes sir!” they saluted him and headed out.
“All that is left is for you both to prepare yourselves,” the General said.
Q turned to Carlos, “Initiate mission?”
His brother grinned, “Initiate mission.”
***
“Idhren,” Elizabeth whispered.
Her brain had not yet processed everything that was going on. Her entire sense of reality was going for a spin.
“High Priest,” Ryul spat. “What a mighty honor to meet the grand schemer.”
A smile briefly lit Idhren’s face, “It is my honor to meet the man whose army will decimate my cities.”
“What?”
“Oh,” Idhren turned to Avon. “Does he not know?”
The Thanonian remained quiet.
“This shall be very entertaining,” Idhren smirked, an expression she’d never imagined to see on his pious being.
“What are you talking about?” Ryul charged at him.
The two men on either side of Idhren went into a low attacking position. The ground beneath Ryul exploded and sent him flying into a pillar.
“Prince Ryul!” Avon rushed to him.
The prince slumped against the pillar, a streak of blood on his cut forehead, “You’re demons,” he muttered.
Idhren walked towards them, “Know your position Prince,” he gripped his staff, and lifted it into the air.
An air attack
, Elizabeth realized. She lifted her hands above her head, and a thick sheet of rock rose between Idhren and Ryul.
The High Priest turned to her and smiled, “Not good enough,” he swung his staff and a blast of wind emerged, shredding her earthen wall and forming a mini-gust around Ryul. Avon hung desperately onto the prince, hoping to protect him against the vortex of winds.
“Let’s go someplace fun,” Idhren raised his staff into the air.
The vortex expanded, covering the expanse of the cave and swirling around like a river of air. Elizabeth retracted her wings, not wanting to get caught up in the haphazard winds. Idhren then swung his staff around and the winds dissolved, revealing a completely different scenario.
He teleported us
, she realized.
Just how powerful is he?
Teleportation was a god-level skill. Creating portals was easy, but teleporting a living being, let alone a group of them, was insanely hard. She took a good look around her. Avon, Ryul and the other Thanonians had been brought along as well. They were in a different sort of cave, only this one looked more like a corridor than an actual cavern.
“Oh my god,” Ryul pointed behind her, fear radiating through his eyes.
She turned around, her hands already reaching for her daggers. But what she saw wasn’t something that could be attacked. It was far worse.
A glass wall stood strong and on the other side was a snow-white room, with a large green sphere in the middle. The sphere stood the entire height of the room and had pipes and tubes extending out of it and into the walls.
“What the hell is that?” Avon asked.
“That, my dear Thanonian,” Idhren peered through the glass. “Is the H.U.L.K.”
“The H.U.L.K?”
“It is a very interesting,” he paused. “Contraption.”
“Sire!” a man ran out of the darkness.
There’s an exit here
, Elizabeth realized. The possibility of escape had been validated. All she had to do was figure out how she’d do it. She immediately felt a strong weight on her shoulders, as though the air was pushing her down. She turned around and saw that all the Thanonians were held down as well. Her eyes caught the powerful glow emanate from the orb atop Idhren’s staff.
He’s holding us down
, she realized, and that meant they weren’t going anywhere until he let them.
The Getafixian man leaned close to Idhren and Elizabeth strained to listen to their conversation, managing to use her suit to amplify their voices.
“What is wrong?” Idhren said, his gaze still fixated on the H.U.L.K.
“The stealth ship Commander Carlos and Q were in was destroyed by the Thanonians.”
Elizabeth’s heart nearly burst.
No
, she thought.
Please
.
Not them too.
“Have they been killed?” Idhren asked, as though he didn’t really care.
“Both the Commander and Q are alive. The cadets we sent though have lost all bio signals and have been declared dead. But one of the cadet’s comm. devices seems to have broken off and nestled in Commander Carlos’ clothing. It relayed back something very interesting.”
He took out a high-tech tablet, and noise started to flow from it.
“
Take them away
,” a voice said. “
We will have these men tell us all they know
.”
The sound of metal handcuffs clinking came through.
“
General Za’ad
,” a voice said, and this time Elizabeth knew exactly who it was.
Carlos.
“
I know
.” Carlos said.
“
You know?
” the other voice asked. “
You know what?
”
“
Prince Ryul.
”
She could hear Idhren’s breathing aggravate. He grabbed the tablet and smashed it against the ground. “ARGH,” he yelled out.
The Getafixian man trembled, and averted eye contact with the High Priest.
“God damn men. Messing up my plans completely.”
“What is wrong, sire?” one of the men in hoods asked.
“Commander Carlos knows of our plans. Call the palace and ask them to check for possible hacks in the system.”
“Yes, sire,” two men bowed and ran into the darkness.
“If Carlos was aware of Prince Ryul’s captivity, he must have found out about project ZeQuest.”
“It’s highly likely, Sire. Project ZeQuest is the only file that has the details of Prince Ryul and Nakiri. If Commander Carlos were able to find one thing out, he probably knows them all.”
“Do we still have access to the comm device?”
“No, Sire. It seems to have fallen off.”
“Fine. See if Falael can be contacted, and make sure you do not use him for our plans. That man does not know of Project ZeQuest.”
“Yes, Sire.”
Idhren rubbed his eyes, “This means those Thanonian idiots won’t carry out the kill order.”
Kill order?
her eyes widened.
What is he talking about?
“What do we do for the H.U.L.K then, Sire?”
“I’ll take care of that,” he flicked his staff. The deluge of wind came again, encompassing all of them in darkness and when it stopped they had teleported to another spot.
Elizabeth found herself in a chair and tried to stand up, but immediately realized she’d been bound to it. Idhren had teleported her straight into the chair. The next thing she realized was that her suit had been deactivated. She had no clue how but it had gone back to bracelet form and was now wrapped around her wrist.
Even though she didn’t have the air regulator she usually had in her helmet, she breathed in regularly, armed with the knowledge that the Armorican atmosphere, much like her home planet, and Earth, had an adequate amount of oxygen present.
“Welcome,” she heard Idhren’s voice from the darkness in front of her. “To what I call the Harvest room.”
A sole light on the ceiling turned on, illuminating a table underneath it. Idhren stood next to the table, his hand touching a machine that hovered over it.
Oh god
, fear struck in Elizabeth’s mind.
The cave walls, the metal chairs, the tables and the machines.
She knew what this place was.
“Ready the extraction engine,” he said and looked down at the table.
Elizabeth saw that a white-haired, elfish boy lay there, bound by his cuffs.
This can’t be happening
, Elizabeth’s mind went into turmoil, waves of anger and anguish washing upon her all at once.
“We thank you for your sacrifice,” Idhren said, “Prince Ryul.”
***