Deepforge (16 page)

Selena scrambled to help reload the magma launchers as the dragons continued hitting the Deepforge wall with various forms of breath weapon. The acid attacks were doing the most damage. Vella came to her side and helped as best she could.

“The metallics are getting their asses handed to them,” Vella said as she and several dwarves loaded up a large scoop of molten rock with the industrial crane, their heat shield suits steaming.

Most of them were accustomed to the intense heat, especially the forgers and metalsmiths. Vella, however, had a rough time of it. Her elven form was not suited for this kind of thing, and because of the kind of dragon she was, working in the kind of heat was tough indeed. She had to resist blowing a breath weapon of cold. Suddenly, she got a telepathic message from her beloved Deccon and stopped what she was doing. The information conveyed to her was startling and unbelievable. She acknowledged receipt and continued working normally as not to arouse suspicion. She now knew who the inside person was, the traitor of Deepforge. Incredulous at the news, it took her several moments to get over it and continue on.

Selena saw her distress, as she was not completely successful at hiding the shock. “Vella, is everything alright?”

Vella looked at her as she operated the guiding tongs. “Yea…everything is…just fine, Selena. As I was saying, I don’t know how long we’re going to hold them off. I just wish I could be out there fighting, but I have strict orders from Bahamlo. I’m not to leave the citadel.”

Selena smiled. “Males, always wanting to protect us, huh?”

“Yea, sometimes it gets a bit…old.” Vella smiled and looked around at all the dwarves working as hard as they could to load up the magma launchers. “They’re getting too hot, we’re not going to be able to keep this up much longer.”

At that point, a large explosion was heard coming from the Great Door.

“They’ve breached! Prepare for hand-to-hand!” someone yelled.

“Your Majesty, we have Deepforge on the radio,” the communications officer reported, kneeling before her.

“Excellent! It’s about damn time,” the Black Queen said. She put out her delicate hand, and Jennifer gently guided her off the throne as if she was as delicate as she seemed. Together they walked hand-in-hand to the radio room.

The radio room was a small closet-sized room. Inside were various ancient looking radios with Earth markings on them and testing devices of different types. A twentieth century amateur radio operator from Earth would have easily recognized each device. The man operating the devices had to learn the art of tuning them the hard way, having burned out several in the process. The radios and various equipment sat on shelves stacked high, with wires running across and attaching to each. The smell of the room was of old radios and ozone. One of the radios hummed with static and glowed from the vacuum tubes inside and the lighted displays on the front, denoting unknown numbers. Jerry Collins, the radio operator, was the only one who could decipher what they meant.

“How’s it coming, Jerry?” the Black Queen asked.

Jerry jumped out of his seat and immediately knelt before her, prostate. “Your Majesty, we have her on frequency. The EM pulse pretty much wiped out everything else. It’s a good thing you had the foresight to shield the power generator, otherwise we would have lost it too.  I’ve only been able to get this one tube radio work—”

“Just get her on. I have no time to talk tech with you.”

“Yes…of course, your Majesty,” he said, nervously.

He turned a few dials slightly, and then began talking into the microphone, “Deepforge, this is Lake Palace, over?”

A female voice came on, “This is Deepforge.”

Jerry handed the microphone to the Black Queen. “Just press this button—”

“I know how to use a microphone.”

“Yes, of course, your Majesty.” He backed away, prostrate.

She grabbed the microphone and began, “Deepforge, this is your Queen. I need a report.”

“Your Majesty! Yes, of course. Well, I still haven’t gotten anything from Daemon or Brendon, but the others have reported that the armies have split forces. Grognor is heading across a mountain path to get here quicker, and the other army is traveling along the River Valley road with the war machines. It’s probably all moot, though. Looks like the damage I did to the inside of the Great Door was unnoticed, but successful. Your army is breaching it as we speak.”

“That’s excellent news. Where are Deccon, Bruno and the Stone Children?”

“Says here… hang on…here it is. Deccon is traveling with the war machines, Bruno and his Stone Children…ok, looks like this Bruno guy disappeared. The Stone Children are with Grognor. Oh! Here comes the bird. Let me get back with you in a minute.”

A few moments passed, and then she came back on the radio, “Your Majesty, we may have a serious problem. This is a note from Daemon, but it’s not in the coded format. It’s his handwriting, but…something’s wrong…”

“I was afraid of this. He’s revealed himself. In any of your messages does it mention anything about Bruno shape shifting?”

“Yes, it says that he turned into …can’t make out the words…well, anyway, strange creatures we’ve never seen before. That’s all I have. Vella is still here and fighting your army. Looks like the chromatics are kicking the metallic dragons’ asses pretty severely, just like you said they would. What are your orders, my Queen?”

“Get out of there. My army doesn’t know who you or the other patriots are, and will kill you if given the chance. Do you have any way out besides the main entrance?”

“No…wait…maybe. I heard of a cooled lava tube, but it was pretty tight as I remember the story.”

“Well, I’ll leave the decision up to you. If you make it out, there will be big rewards waiting for you. Good work, you have gained my favor.”

There was a momentary pause, and then an emotional reply was heard. “Thank you, my most gracious Queen!”

The Black Queen handed the microphone back to Jerry and smiled warmly at him. “You have also gained my favor. You will come and pleasure me.”

“Yes! Oh! Yes, your majesty!” His eagerness was undeniable.

She smiled at Jennifer, who also smiled. She then pulled the velvet pouch from her belt. “So, he’s made himself known. Once I do this, he will be alerted. But, I can’t let him continue on. Time to shut the First One down.” She reached in and pulled out the coin. The velvet pouch disintegrated as she did so.

The snow was falling hard in the northern mountains. The entire landscape was white, whiter than seemed possible. The thick cloud cover obscured the suns, but the landscape was still brighter that it should have been. Everywhere one looked, it was white. The snow got higher and higher, and the horses struggled more and more to get through. Just when it seemed it couldn’t get any worse, the wind began to kick up and the snow began to fall even harder. It had become a full-fledged blizzard. Nobody talked, it was pointless. Hearing was impossible as the wind whipped the walls of thick snow across the mountains, covering the short alpine trees and the army as they traveled.

Grognor and the dwarves had seen blizzards before, but the others in the army were having a tough time comprehending the enormity of it all. Grognor looked around at them, only able to see just the few very close by in the thick wind whipped snowfall. At that point, he felt someone tugging on his thick coat. It was Cray. He looked over to him, but could barely make him out. He was waving, beckoning Grognor to follow. He looked around again, he could see all of the Stone Children trying to get the army to follow. Without hesitation, they did so. It was rough going, but they stayed as close to their guides as possible. As they did so, the short alpine trees and shrubs suddenly stopped on the landscape. They had hit tundra. It was as if somebody had flipped a switch, putting the blizzard in high gear.              

Cray yelled into Grognor’s ear, “Give me your rope! We’re going to string everyone together!”

Grognor could barely make out the words, but understood. He reached over and grabbed his rope, having to knock the snow off of it. His horse seemed to shiver as he did so. This was getting serious. He handed it to Cray and tied one end to his saddle. Moments went by, everyone was stopped. This was a bad thing. The snow fall was heavier than ever, and the army was quickly being buried. Cray returned and grabbed Grognor’s horse as another Stone Child grabbed Teelena’s. Teelena was barely holding on, but she was faring better than the humans. Unbeknownst to anyone, they had already lost over two dozen humans from the harsh storm.

The Stone Children guided the army until the storm seemed to calm down a bit. It was an illusion that became uncovered as they moved forward. They could see ahead of them. There was a high mountain peak in front of them, shielding them from the full onslaught of the blizzard. As they continued to move toward it, the snowfall and terrible wind reduced until they stood at the base of a large cave entrance. They could see and hear each other again. The Stone Children continued to guide them in until they were all inside the massive cave.

“I didn’t want to take us here because the route around will cost us another half a day, but there’s no other choice. This storm isn’t slowing down,” Cray explained as he helped Teelena and Grognor off their horses.

“Better we actually get there. Thank you, Cray,” Teelena said.

“Yes, thank you. We need to get a fire going and get our horses and everyone else comfortable,” Grognor said.

The storm raged outside, making loud whipping and moaning sounds as they made camp and assessed their losses. Eugene and the other Naw-nee made several camp fires with the available dry wood, which wasn’t much.

“All we have is the wood we brought with us and the roots in the cave. Once we’ve thawed out a bit we’ll have to knock it down,” Eugene said, motioning to the fires.

“Thank you, this will do fine. Just being out of that will help a great deal,” Teelena said.

They all got as comfortable as they could and got ready for the cold night to come.

Grognor heard a telepathic voice in his head. “Sire, this is Bruno. Send me an image of where you are.”

“Ok, how do I do that?”

“Just look around, and think of me.”

He did so.

“Got it.”

A spit second later, the space in front of Grognor warped, revealing Daemon.

Grognor unlatched his axe. “You!”

Daemon then morphed into Bruno. “No, Sire, it’s me.”

Grognor instantly understood. “Oh, right. So, what did you discover?”