Monday, March 11, 2019

1:16: Scions of War

Typhon and Echidna got to their feet, looking young and healthy again, though their armor was still rusted and rotted from Kronos's magic. Kronos reached out with both hands and unleashed more of his black lightning on the two humans. Their armor disintegrated, leaving them both stark naked on the battlefield, but they didn't age or wither. To the contrary, they seemed to get somewhat larger and... more powerful looking.

"Why don't you die?!" Kronos shouted, striking again.

"Because they're immortal now," Prometheus said, "just like us."

Nyx moved to blind the humans with her powers, but Echidna flipped her tarnished bronze shield off the ground with one foot to block the blast, and then threw it at the titan. Nyx caught the shield like a child’s discus, but the momentary distraction was enough for Echidna to tackle her, pinning her black-feathered wings under her. She slashed at Echidna with her talons, expecting human flesh that would fall to tatters under her onslaught, but instead her claws were no more effectual than an ordinary human’s finger nails.

Nyx’s attack was painful enough to anger Echidna more, but ineffectual enough to embolden her as well. The woman began hammering her fists down on the Titan, striking with strength far greater than any human being should have been able to summon. Nyx's nose and jaw broke, her blood splattering through the air with each punch. Nyx started crying and screaming something about a baby, blood burbling out with each word.

Kronos lit up his hands, hoping for an opening to shock Echidna, but Typhon rushed him. Kronos dodged, flitting about on his black wings like a perching bird boldly taunting a cat. Just as the human woman was suddenly strong enough to wrestle with Nyx, the human man was nearly fast enough to catch Kronos. Based on Prometheus's observation, Kronos reasoned that the Legacies of Kasios and Tiamat must be transforming the humans into titans, and bet that meant they would still be vulnerable to ferrous metals, same as himself. He snatched up one of the steel throwing spears strewn on the battlefield and threw it at Typhon – Typhon caught it, spun, and threw the spear back at Kronos, nearly striking one of his leathery wings. Kronos grabbed another spear, flew up into the air, and then dived down on Typhon, striking from the sun.

Blinded by the sunlight, Typhon dodged the wrong direction, and Kronos’s spear struck him square in his bare chest... and came to a dead stop. The impact knocked Typhon down, but instead of skewering him the weapon only knocked the wind out of him. Kronos landed on him and started punching him, channeling his old electricity powers into his fists, so that each strike shocked Typhon – that drew blood and blackened skin, but it didn’t pulverize Typhon’s skull as it did the rocks below him. Typhon finally managed to get an arm up and grabbed Kronos’s throat, digging his finger nails in and squeezing it, as he thrust his knee upward, striking the Titan between his belly button and his groin.

Kronos, surprised by the force of the impact, let up on his assault for a moment, and Typhon cracked him across the jaw with his freehand before moving to a two-handed stranglehold. Kronos struggled for air – even titans needed to breathe – and drew all of the energy he had left into a single powerful lightning bolt grounded through himself. The jolt to the man beneath him was enough to free Kronos, but before he could finish his enemy, Nyx’s badly beaten body slammed into him from the side, knocking him down. Echidna picked up a spear and closed on the two Titans as Typhon got back to his feet.

Nyx was badly injured, in desperate need of healing, and Kronos realized that – without a full understanding of what the legacies had done to the humans – there was a very real danger of losing this fight. If that happened, he and Nyx would be the first titans in thousands of years to be killed by humans. Running from the two human soldiers would be humiliating, politically debilitating, but it was better than being killed by them. Kronos grabbed Nyx and flew up and away as fast as he could manage.

Typhon and Echidna stood on the battlefield breathing heavily. After a long silence, Typhon finally broke into a smile and started laughing, “Holy shit, we fought them. We fought them and we didn’t die.”

“Didn’t die? We damn near killed them!” Echidna shouted. She and Typhon clasped each other’s arms and then pounded the fists of their free hands together – the sound of their knuckles colliding echoed across the plain. They stepped back from each other, bewildered by their own strength.

The warriors turned to see their commander sitting next to a bloody pool in the grass, his elbows on his knees, and his eyes fixed on the ground. Hekate’s body was nowhere to be seen.

“General… what happened to Hekate…?” Typhon asked, “Was her death... an illusion?

“No, I’m afraid not,” Prometheus said, “Macaria grabbed the bracelet that allowed Hekate to travel as she did, and they both vanished.”

“To where?” Echidna asked.

“I don’t know – maybe nowhere in particular. Hekate was probably the only one who knew how to operate that device – frankly, it’s remarkable Macaria even knew which bracelet was the right one. Hekate wore a lot of bracelets…”

“What do we do now?” Typhon asked, “We’re all traitors now – we even assaulted the king. It’s pretty much win or die.”

“Or leave, run,” Echidna said, “But I’m not keen to run to my freedom while leaving our countrymen in bondage.”

“Damn straight," Typhon said, "We’re right here at the gates of Knossos, should we just… go for it?”

“No,” Prometheus stood up and regained his composure, “We’re in the middle of a very confusing situation. There’s no telling who among your countrymen…”

Our countrymen,” Echidna said, “human or titan, we’re all rebels now.”

Prometheus nodded, “There’s no telling who among us will follow us into rebellion. Hekate believed that many would, even after fighting this civil war, she believed that if I betrayed Kronos, the army would follow. That’s possible, but I think many will remain loyal to Kronos, and if pressed to decide now, many will default to his side. If we attempt to siege Knossos now, the result will be two human armies dissolving into uncertainty and chaos. And you two... humans bonding with Legacy A.I.s, that's unprecedented. There's no telling what might happen.”

"When you say, 'no telling'... you mean...?" Typhon fished for clarification.

"Well, I already know my Legacy will eventually be passed onto a human with no ill effects, so I wagered that you two would be fine. But my Legacy has never been 'normal' per se, and I know that the first human who will bear my Legacy receives it after a bit of a hazy spot in my foresight, so it's possible that something will happen in that gap to make my Legacy human-friendly..."

"So... what's going to happen to us then?" Echidna asked.

"You could be fine. Better than fine," Prometheus answered, "Or you could suddenly develop every form of cancer in the medical books and violently explode into a mass of malignant pus."

"That's a possiblity?" Echidna said alarmed.

"That I just made up completely," Prometheus said, "which is sort of my point - who knows? We should take you two somewhere quiet where you can... I don't know, find yourselves?"

"Selakano?" Typhon asked, "Its not what it used to be, but if people want to join you, they'll go to your stronghold there."

"And Kronos will probably be thinking the same thing," Echidna said, "So we probably ought to hurry."

"Agreed - go to the other commanders, tell them that if they want to join us now, they can follow us to Selakano. If they don't, then they can do whatever the hell they want so long as they don't try to stop us. Oh, also, clothes..." Prometheus conjured a couple of simple red cloaks for the warriors to wrap around themselves until they could reattire themselves properly.

While Typhon and Echidna set about the business of getting the army moving again, Prometheus went back to the bloody patch in the grass. It was all he had left of Hekate. Prometheus wanted to imagine a world where she was still alive, where they hadn't tip-toed around each other for centuries. Nights of passion, grand adventures, even, eventually, a family... He wanted to imagine that all of tht still existed out there in some alternate, perfect reality, but then he remembered what Tiamat had taught him about destroying possible futures - that path was gone, erased with Hekate. 

Prometheus was on the path Hekate had laid out for him, but would have to follow it through without her. Alone. Some part of him felt like there wasn't even a point - there would be no happy ending for him - but the humans needed him, and Hekate had wanted, in her own way, to save them from Kronos and the others. Honoring that wish was the only piece of her he had left, so he wasn't going to let go of it.  

"If there's some other plane of existence out there, where we go when we die," Prometheus whispered into the wind, "if there's any chance you can hear me, Hekate, I promise I won't disappoint you."

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