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ES04 - Eternal Sunder (part 04): The Song of Sunder
Posted By: Wado<wyamauchi@msn.com>
Date: 30 November 2003, 11:06 AM
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Note: This is part 4 to Wado's Eternal Sunder series.
The Song of Sunder
"The shadows of the unknown burn dark and deep on this planet Neep," stated the beautiful Archonian Princess Kira. "We must wake from our sleep, we have promises to keep."
"But my princess, I know not what is reality or what is vituality?" replied Croaker, the usually sturdy Sauran. "Alas, I will try what you decree, or else I fear we will fail in this journey."
"Can we dispense with this rhyming nonsense?" asked Max the Imperial Elite. "Whence did this sequence begin to be so immense, you can't have the pretense to keep us in such suspense?"
"Yes, Princess, why do we speak in rhyme, something I have never done in my long lifetime?" added John. He opened his mouth once more, not entirely sure what words would be his encore. "I do not wish to chime in rhyme, this is not playtime. This has gone on for sometime; I only wish I was a mime."
"This is not silliness, you only feel helpless," stated Kira. "Get over your meekness and show some of your warrior greatness."
"but... I feel like a nut," muttered Croaker.
In but a few minutes, John had gone from the verge of insanity to a limerick saying fool. This place was madness and Princess Kira, in her infinitely persistent obfuscation had started something she referred to as the Song of Sunder. John knew little of this annoying song, but it cursed him to rhyme. Every phrase, every word now became the rhythm of the absurd.
"Princess, what is this spell, please tell," inquired Max.
"Because you wonder, I will tell you this is the song of Sunder," sang the beautiful princess. Those were the only words of explanation from her.
Long ago the Archons had traveled to this galaxy. They were immortal because when they died their spirit was passed on to as a new born. So the cycle goes on and on. Sometimes, rarely, the cycle fails, for whatever reason. Princess Kira had been reborn seventeen times but in this mana dead zone, there was no escape for her spirit should she perish. This horrid city of Cyber freaks could be her last resting place. In such times, the realization of one's mortality brings Archons to almost human levels, except for the Archons can see their own deaths to come. Be it a gift or a curse, Princess Kira knew she would die this day. She told no one of this reality, instead she summoned all the power she had left for one final spell -- The Song of Sunder, Eternal Sunder.
John spoke with clarity, although his words still rhymed unbelievably. "I don't want to sound weirder, but my mind seems much clearer. Take very good heed and follow my lead." The power of the song had not only forced him to rhyme but in return it dispelled delusion.
Max replied saying, "Although my words may mimic in sound, my thoughts are clear and solid as the ground. Better a rhyme to clear the head, than end up dead." The scenery became clearer and shadows formed into the creatures that had created them.
So now John and the others saw the truth of what was happening. All around John, creatures were attached to his armor. They slowly sucked away his energy and life. They had not suddenly appeared from nowhere, these creatures had been there the whole time, except John could not perceive them through the mask of delusion that had previously enchanted him. The Song of Sunder had brought him back to reality and the others too.
"The mind tricks are no more, now I'll fry you to the core," exclaimed John. His shield grew brightly hot; one hundred million degrees of fiery plasma cooked and electrocuted the creatures. They overloaded and exploded. John was left standing in a crater fifty meters deep and a kilometer across. His new armor was a fusion of Terran, Archonian, Praetorian, and Nomdian technologies. This armor had proved more powerful than anything he had ever imagined. In any other time, in any other company, John in this armor could have been hailed as a god, a world destroyer, the life giver, the almighty himself.
"Not bad, but don't be sad," came the voice of Max, "because you haven't seen nothing yet, and on my words you can bet." Max disappeared, phasing in and out of reality the creatures that had attached to Max fell lose. Max placed his hand inside one of them and phased back into reality. The creature exploded and as a result Max stood next to John in the same crater only now it was ten meters deeper.
"Fancy dandies, you two want some candies?" bellowed Croaker. He wasted little time with fancy maneuvers. He squished the creatures on him like small bugs.
"Such rudeness all of you, remember ladies first boo who," feinted Princess Kira. Then she smiled and all the creatures on her bowed in awe of her beauty and terribleness. They transformed into dust and reformed into flowers and bushes. The once burning crater was now a tropical paradise.
Ice fell on the paradise and the frozen plants broke. Then a familiar female voice came from above saying, "Curse your Archonian way, you have ruined an eternity of work in less than a day." There was no body to the voice, only two enormous eyes peering down from the sky. They were eyes without a face.
"John, that is not the Cortana as we knew her, this being is filled with anger," whispered Princess Kira over the secured com channels. "Be warned, she is ever so clever, even more than when she was younger. Speak to her, be your ever so loving charmer."
"You have been sentenced for the murder of my daughter, the penalty is death by carnage and slaughter," bellowed a female voice from the heavens.
John knew that sooner or later the impatience of Cortana would wear thin and she would reveal herself amongst all the tricks. The scanner on his armor noted a large power spike a hundred kilometers below. All John needed to do was to keep Cortana occupied long enough for Kira to trace the power spike to exactly its source. The source of the power would lead them to the true hiding place of Cortana.
"Bring it on Cortana, but before we end this saga, you must know your daughter died with the honor fitting of Sparta," stated John, "and killing and strife will not bring her back to life."
"How stiflingly poetic, almost like it was rhetoric," chanted Cortana's voice from above. "Know whatever game you play that compels me to talk in rhymes, I can beat to a magnitude of seven trillion times. Now let the battle begin; to pay for you sin."
Materializing through a teleportation grid, the armies of cyber warriors arrived. Kira sensed that deep inside these mechanical bodies were the souls of once organic beings, the former inhabitants of Neep, now trapped in a nightmare world of eternal sleep. "These souls are innocent; we must defeat them without incident," commanded Kira.
Death was part of nature. The Archonians knew this, but Kira in her Song of Sunder did not wish to be part of the slaughter of innocents. She solemnly willed the others to feel the pain of the innocent souls trapped in the mechanical bodies. She commanded them to win without loss of innocent life.
As the horde approached from all sides, John, Kira, Croaker and Max split up. This was not the tactics of a millennium past; each one of them was an army onto themselves. Their armor alone was more than a match for anything short of a fully armed battle cruiser. Never mind their own personal abilities that put them far above the ranks of the best of the most elite combat troops.
"Princess Kira, do you know what you ask?" said Max. "Winning a war without loss of innocent life is a near impossible task."
"Allow me and Max you will see," declared Princess Kira as she drew her sword -- A long straight sword, as thin as a ray of light and as bright as the morning sun. "Behold Isababel, the Sword of Sharp Tongues and Nimble Dazzle,"
"I did not know how you countered this mana dead zone," bellowed the voice from above. "Now I see that you brought a mana supply of your own; these actions Princess Kira, I cannot condone."
"Cortana, you speak with such conviction, but I need not ask for your permission," laughed Princess Kira while brandishing the sword proudly above for all to see, "and now I am on a mission."
"Your papa was a Guilty Spark rejectee and your mama was a trash eighty," echoed the sword called Isababel in a thundering voice, and with those words the first wave of cyber attackers kneeled down in despair and started to cry. They muttered phrases like, "Good old mum, I don't remember her, how come? Waaaaaaaah! Baaaaaah!"
The power of the sword was great to leave these cyber warriors balling at their fate, but many more followed in arms, and the fight went on. From the North several hundred formed into ranks four deep. First row prone, second kneeling, third standing and fourth in reserve. They concentrated their fire on Princess Kira, everything from 20 millimeter high-velocity auto-cannons, fusion guns, plasma rifles and tactical nuclear grenade launchers. Large, fiery craters formed all around as shots deflected off of Kira's armor.
Princess Kira responded with crossed arms and from her battle suit came thousands of tiny flying sparks. These were stingers and as they flew around her, they protected her from the onslaught like tiny shields all hooked together into a large encompassing wall -- A moving wall that swarmed on the attackers; their stings paralyzing the enemy. During all of this, she sang, "From the King of Thunder and the Queen of Wonder, I was born the silver-eyed girl with command of the underworld."
"You may hold the North gate, but Princess Kira I predict death is your fate," the voice from above murmured in the breeze. Then a new army of dark and spiny cyber monsters appeared brandishing weapons of mass destruction. Kira smiled, she sensed the souls in these creatures were far from innocent.
"I was to be Zeva the swift sword of Shai'tan,
but I was not of his demon blood as he planned," sang Kira as she fired plasma and anti-matter contained in powerful graviton and magnetic forces. Bolts blasted through the cyber monsters followed by a thermal wave that boiled their metallic parts. Whole groups exploded in the anti-matter reactions and the ground rumbled from chained implosions that left the lot of the bodies fused into dense balls of ashes. "A secret kept by my mother, he never knew of the other. Serves him right, he stole her from her peoples. Lord Shai'tan, master of maggot weevils."
On the East, Max went unseen except for the destruction he left in his wake. In his cloaked form, he drove the cyber warriors into a panic causing them to fire even on themselves. It was certainly not a challenge for the mighty Elite in his new battle armor. Max quickly reassessed the situation without losing stride, he could not let them kill themselves; innocent blood must not be lost. "The art of the sword is the art of killing, I tried to defeat them otherwise but they are not willing."
Croaker spoke from the South through secured channels, "This does not seem right, I know their survival is a goal in this fight, but these foes have not nearly enough might." His bio-shells had unintentionally impacted on a few of the enemy turning them into living bombs that would soon explode with devastating effect. "What was intended for the monsters in the deep; has sadly impacted on the innocents that we weep."
"What is that you say? John said in dismay. "That can't be there must be another way." This city would be left in ruins with all its dwellers doomed. Despite Kira's command, innocent life would be lost.
Princess Kira continued her melody, "From Guardian of Earth is my true rite of birth. I was conceived half human girl with eyes on another dark world. I am Kira Zeva Zerlinda Merkava, sovereign princess of the Archons karma." And with the last phrase, her armor glowed with a multi-colored blaze.
"You prepare for your own demise, I'd say you were wise," came the voice from above once more. Cortana seemed ever so bold despite the imminent defeat of her warriors. "The long trip here was to analyze your armor, and so now say hello to my pet mauler. Don't believe this is all just a game, in the end you will go down in flame."
Innocent souls would perish, but not at the hands of Kira or the others. Cortana would be the cause, ordering her mauler to fire from high above, a beam of pure energy, several magnitudes more than what was necessary to overload the weakened shields and armor of the group. The whole battlefield was leveled several kilometers deep through solid ground. Nothing, absolutely nothing was left except for the fried remains of four battlesuits and the broken sword Isababel.
"Pathways so far and deep, whispering souls weep. They tell of my sweet, sweet sorrow. We have no morrow. The song of sunder has begun, and when it's finished, I am done."
Silence and darkness fell.
"I have little left, my city is gone, my servants dead. But I have killed my daughter's murderer, at least vengeance is mine," wept the words of Cortana.
"You have nothing left Cortana," replied the voice of John. "Princess Kira used the last of her power to transport Max, Croaker and me here, with this little friend."
"Your friend is a bomb, a powerful bomb," stated Cortana. "How could I not have known?"
"None of us knew Cortana," said John. "Kira imbedded the understanding inside us to be released upon her death. Now you have no where to go."
"Why John?" asked Cortana. "You would sacrifice all of us when all you could have done is left me alone to my misery."
"We couldn't do that Cortana," stated John without remorse. "You hold the balance of power in our war against the Biomechs. If you did not willingly join us, we have no choice but to destroy you. We cannot risk you falling into the hands of the enemy."
"In my madness the Biomech agents tried to infect me many times," said Cortana. "They never succeeded. My madness combined with strong emotions halted the infection. You could leave now and take this information back to the Great Council."
"There's no way out Cortana," whispered John. He started the countdown timer on the bomb strapped to his back.
"Understood John," replied Cortana. Then lightning bolts shot forth from the core system where Cortana resided. Croaker placed himself between John and the core. The lightning struck Croaker; he screamed in pain but held his ground.
More lightning ricocheted off of the walls and ceiling. Max threw his body at the bolts. He convulsed in pain but kept John and the bomb safe.
Three, two, one... John thought moments before the countdown reached zero that he heard a familiar Cortana saying "Chief, chief..." to him. It was a good thought, his last thoughts before the bomb exploded.
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