Monday, March 11, 2019

1.13: Pandora's Box

Prometheus, understanding that the war was also a battle for the hearts and minds of the humans that fed their powers, did everything he could to manage their images. He inundated the people – Titans and humans alike – with propaganda.  He composed poetic ballads praising Kronos, spreading tales of heroism and valor, and angelic statues celebrating Kronos’s death-from-above aerial campaign. His renditions depicted Kasios and Tiamat as demonic monsters, driven by a lust for carnage. Following their intimate encounter after the battle of Selakano Valley, though, Prometheus played soft with Hekate's image. He'd already had doubts about Kronos's leadership when Hekate came to him, and when she left, he was beginning to think about alternative paths ahead. Just in case Prometheus ultimately decided she was right, he some breathing room to make decisions - if he convinced all of his followers that Hekate was the ultimate evil, his options would be far more limited.


Unfortunately, Prometheus could see Tiamat’s projections playing out. Without the Malanginui Legacy, Kronos had to push himself to simply throw a lightning bolt. That over-extension consistently correlated with an increase in casualties among their human troops, with those most devoted to his king being the most likely to be injured or killed. When Kronos created something as grand as a full out thunderstorm, the consequences for the helots were terrible. Hekate and her lieutenants fought smarter, instead of harder, leaning into their knowledge of ancient strategies and sciences, and foregoing massive earth-shifting displays - unfortunately, while Hekate eased up to reduce the burden on the people, Kronos responded by doubling down. He used his powers whenever there was the faintest justification for it and sought out circumstances that would force his hand. Crete's helots suffered - it began to seem that, if the violence of the war didn't maim or kill someone, seemingly random misfortune would. Plagues swept the island in waves, killing helots and their livestock. The crops withered under blights and droughts. Sinkholes swallowed homes and mudslides washed away coastal villages. Feral dogs, left homeless by the war, hunted and killed children that strayed from their parents' sight.

Prometheus thought often of the idyllic virtual world Kronos's six (legitimate) children were living in, and wondered if his king would be so careless with his power if they could see the consequences.

Of course, Prometheus continued to follow his enemies’ lead – rather than summoning volcanos to swallow Hekate’s soldiers or geothermal vents to cut them apart with high pressure steam, he simply continued to teach Crete's human blacksmiths how to smelt iron and create steel alloys.

While Kasios wielded a futuristic armory that he could summon from thin air with a thought, he didn’t have the means to manufacture the weapons en masse for Hekate’s armies. Instead, most of Hekate’s forces fought with weapons and armor of wood, bone, bronze, and leather. A steel spear could pierce a bronze shield and chest-plate quite well, and gave a human soldier a real chance of harming the enemy Titans. The naval war practically came to a conclusion after Oceanos’s iron-prowed warships began hunting Tiamat. With the water-loving titan driven out of Crete's shipping lanes, Kronos had more iron ore shipped in from far and wide to reinforce their walls and tip their spears.

It was on the eve of what Prometheus imagined might be the decisive, conclusive battle that Pandora appeared in Prometheus’s tent, looking as if she’d been badly beaten. None had seen her since the day she and Hekate stole the Legacies.

Typhon and Echidna, still Prometheus’s two most trusted officers, immediately moved to bind her in iron shackles, assuming her to be an assassin. Pandora was not an overtly threatening sight at her best, but Prometheus knew that she could have easily dispatched the two human warriors with one of her spells. Instead she pleaded to be given asylum, begging for a chance to parlay. Prometheus indulged her, told his lieutenants to stand down, and the four sat down to discuss what had happened to her and why she was there.

“I miss your brother,” Pandora said tearfully, “Epimetheus was a good man, a good husband. I felt so alone after he passed… I should have come to you for help with this but…”

“I miss him too,” Prometheus admitted. His brother had been unwise, even foolish by the standards of their long-lived race. Epimetheus never thought things through fully, he acted impetuously, and eventually his recklessness had gotten the better of him. Despite that, Prometheus missed him – he’d always born the responsibility of reining the man in, but his brother had often been the one to get him moving.

“After he died, I felt rudderless, and Hekate came to me with a new purpose to fill the void. She told me all of these terrible stories about our ancestors. She told me that using our powers was making people sick, harming them. I didn’t want it to be true, but Lauma’s Legacy confirmed everything she said," Pandora looked at the two humans seated with them, "I’m sorry… did they know?”

“We knew,” Captain Typhon said.

“General Prometheus warned us a some time ago,” Captain Echidna explained, “We’ve kept it a secret so far – our armies would fold quickly without Kronos’s Titans striking from the air, and they need all the prayers they can get to keep that up.”

“That’s probably wise,” Pandora nodded.

“I don’t understand, though,” Prometheus said, “How did knowing that lead to your treachery at the sacrifice?”

“Hekate said that the titan population would continue to grow, and that if the human population didn’t outpace us by a wide enough margin, our civilization would reach a catastrophic end. Everything we have is built on the backs of human labor, and if the humans weaken and die under our reign, we’ll follow suit.”

“I don’t know whether to be offended or flattered,” Echidna said.

“It’s good to know that someone appreciates us,” Typhon added.

“Obviously, simply pressing the humans to go forth and cover the earth isn’t necessarily an efficient solution, nor is trying to restrain the growth of our population. Hekate claimed, though, that convincing everyone to relinquish their Legacies would be a good stopgap that might give us time to explore other solutions.”

“Everyone?”

“Everyone,” Pandora said, “Hekate believed, or said she believed, that everyone would go through with it.”

“But then I didn’t.”

“I don’t think that really mattered,” Pandora said, “I think Hekate always intended to keep her power. I assumed she was sincere, at first, but then after the sacrifice we had an argument. I always respected you, and she did too. I said that we should just tell you the problem with using our powers, then give up our legacies so you’d be the only one left – then you would have the power to take control of the kingdom and work towards a solution for the benefit of the humans.

“But Hekate insisted that the only person who could do that, the only person who could save us, was her,” Pandora explained, “It had to be her or no one, so she tortured me until I divulged Lauma’s access codes for Tartarus, and freed those two monsters to just… destroy everything.”

“So you’ve been her prisoner this entire time?” Prometheus asked, “How did you escape?”

Pandora wiggled her fingers like a street magician and the familiar gold coin appeared in her hand, “Hekate carried it with her everywhere – I’m sure it helped her break into Tartarus – but at the end of the day, I’m its creator and master. It has a will to work its way back to me.”

“And the coin’s luck let you escape?”

“Partly,” Pandora said, “But also I used it to pull out the screws that were holding my cell door together.” She handed the coin to Prometheus, “It probably seems like too little, too late, but you’re going to need it.”
“As much as anything,” Prometheus said, “It’s good to know Hekate doesn’t have it. Besides the strategic advantage of being lucky, I was legitimately concerned she might try to grow her army’s strength by passing the Legacies onto some of the Titans that sided with her. I mean, she still has the box, but it’s no good without the coin, right?”

“Well, actually…" Pandora pulled another quaint magic trick and pulled the small box from her sleeve. "I grabbed it before I ran, I've been trying to keep it hidden since, but it's been difficult. Get this close enough to Tiamat, Kasios, or Hekate and all you’ll need is for them to breath into it,” Pandora said, “Just don’t trap yourself in there with them. And promise me something...”

"What?" Prometheus asked as he took the box from her.

"Do not, under any circumstances give Kronos the box," Pandora said, "He's become a monster, and if he bonds with one of the Legacies, he'll be unstoppable."

Prometheus studied the box for a moment and finally nodded, "Agreed."

Prometheus decided to grant Pandora’s request for asylum, but didn’t trust her far enough to send her back to the capitol. While Typhon took the woman to the camp’s mess for some hot food, Prometheus discussed their situation with Echidna.

“These spirits the gods have born since time immemorial,” Echidna didn’t have the knowledge base to fully understand the concept, but she grasped the basics, “Do you still believe that the gods should have such power? Knowing what you do now?”

“Well, I’m certain that Kasios and Tiamat shouldn’t,” Prometheus said, “And I think Pandora's right that Kronos should be denied the power as well. I’m not sure I have the wisdom to decide who gets one and who doesn’t, though, so perhaps the fairest thing is to remove all of them as Oranos wished, and bury them somewhere they’ll never trouble us again.”

“Kronos will be furious,” Echidna said.

“Yes, and if I betray him his first move will be to try and coerce me into returning the Legacies to him.”

“You’re worried he will come for your family?”

“No, Crete's condition is poor enough that Kronos’s position in Knossos has become tenuous – if he starts killing other Titans just to punish me, our people would turn on him quickly. I’m afraid it’s much more likely he’ll target your people – few besides me would shed a tear if he started executing slaves.”

“May I speak freely?” Echidna asked.

“Please do.”

“I appreciate your decision to be honest with us,” Echidna said, “And I think we’ve all come to grips with what you’ve told us, but I find myself wondering, why am I fighting for Kronos?

“Honestly, I never was,” Prometheus said, “Kronos is one man – my loyalty is to our people, our nation. Is that not also your cause?”

“Why should I fight for a nation that treats me like a commodity?” Echidna asked, “You say, ‘our people’, but the Titans and the humans are not one people, any more than a pack of wolves is part of the flock they prey upon.”

“Are you wanting to defect, or just to walk away?” Prometheus asked straightforwardly.

“I want to follow you,” Echidna said, “And so does Typhon and countless other men and women under your command. I wouldn’t object to being ruled over by a Titan, if he’s a fair, just, and forward-thinking man. Some of the men and women fighting for you are devoted to Kronos or the others within the great city, but many are loyal to you. Turn on Kronos and we will support you.”

Prometheus let out a breath – it was dangerous talk, and it was uncanny how it echoed Hekate's words to him. “However this ends, Tiamat and Kasios need to fall first,” he said, “Then... we'll see. Can you check on the progress of our preparations? Those iron pikes need to be completely concealed, and make sure they’re all pointed south, and buried at a 45 degree angle.”

“Yes my lord,” Echidna nodded, picked up her spiked helmet and left.

Prometheus returned to the map table. He’d convinced Kronos to take a final gamble; by shuffling some troops and feigning some infrastructural misfortune, he’d managed to make Knossos look vulnerable from the North. It would be too tempting of a target for Hekate to pass up, and going by the last reports, Kasios was tearing across the Cretan countryside from the south while Tiamat closed in on the nearby port city, Heraklion. Ordinarily, the sensible thing would be for the two warriors to attack Knossos from both sides, flanking the city, but Prometheus had posted a large force to the southwest of Knossos with one purpose – to encourage Kasios to circle around the city and attack the seemingly vulnerable point there.

Kronos, for all of his faults, was a master of timing, and had managed to manipulate their progress so that Kasios would arrive at the north side of Knossos about the same time Tiamat did. The two of them together, in one place, would be extraordinarily more difficult to defeat, but based on their previous battles, Prometheus had learned the folly of engaging them one-at-a-time – the two villains had a nasty habit of rescuing one another. Prometheus was betting a large portion of their forces on an ambitious plan to take down both of them at once, and a central part of that plan was the thin assumption that Prometheus could pull the same sort of tricks Hekate could.

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