Chapter Three: The Best Laid Plans
When
the Feliner’s hatch opened and the trio of
Thundercats stepped out into the Horde complex called the Fright Zone, they
were not sure what to expect. The name
had been enough to make them raise their eyebrows, but many names, especially
those of foreign or city bases, did not necessarily
make sense when translated into the standard language. However, the Fright Zone seemed to live up to
its name. It was dark and industrial
complex, built to look efficient and intimidating. Then again, they were aware that Etheria had
some civil issues going on between the Horde government and some of the locals,
so they supposed that it was meant to look that way as a show of power for
their primary government.
Several
robots that looked just like the one on the viewscreen with whom Lion-O had
conversed earlier were gathered on the landing pad outside the Feliner, as well
as two individuals who they assumed to be Horde military officials. One was Force Captain Catra, and the other a
humanoid creature with greenish skin called Leech.
“Greetings,”
Catra purred smoothly, approaching the Thunderian visitors with a smile. She was pleased that Hordak had permitted her
to be in the welcoming party given her own background. “I’m Catra, Force Captain of the Horde here
on Etheria. Hordak is looking forward to
meeting you Thundercats. In the
meantime, we’ve been asked to make you feel welcome here.”
Leech
stepped forward, not nearly as friendly as Catra. “The robots will refuel your ship while we
take you to see Hordak.”
“Thank
you, Captain Catra and—” Lion-O looked to the green-skinned man, “I didn’t get
your name?”
“Leech.” His response was short and
blunt.
“Pleasure
to meet you,” Cheetara said politely.
“I’m Cheetara.”
“And
I’m Lion-O,” the Thundercat Lord added with a smile.
“Panthro,”
Panthro finished. “We appreciate your
being so helpful.”
Catra
turned toward Panthro, and it was then that the panther noticed how attractive the
Horde Force Captain was. Naturally, her
outfit was cut in such a way that it caught male attention easily, but even
without benefit of that she was quite striking in appearance to him.
“Oh,
it’s our pleasure, believe me,” Catra assured in a sweet tone. “Your fugitives wasted no time getting on
our, rowr, bad side.” She met Panthro’s
gaze. “You’re a panther Thunderian,
aren’t you?”
Panthro
nodded. “Yes I am, but how did you
know? Your leader Hordak said he’d never
heard of New Thundera.”
“Maybe
Hordak hasn’t,” Catra said with a shrug as the group of them made their way
down the halls of the Fright Zone, “but some of my ancestors were panther
Thunderians several generations back.
I’ve always had an affinity toward the feline side of my heritage,” she
finished with a light purring undertone.
“I
might be biased, but I don’t think you can go wrong with some panther blood in
you,” Panthro said with a grin.
Cheetara
chuckled lightly. “Maybe you’re just a
little biased.”
“A
tad,” Lion-O laughed along with her.
Leech,
a few steps ahead and bored with the small talk, opened a set of grand doors
that led into Hordak’s throne room.
“Hordak will see you in here.” He
gestured for them to enter. The robots
entered first, followed by Catra, the Thundercats, and then finally Leech
himself. Inside the room Hordak sat upon
his throne while Mantenna, Grizzlor, and Shadow Weaver stood beside it,
interested in the Thunderian visitors.
All
three of the Thundercats felt somewhat nervous as all eyes were on them. The walk to the center of the room seemed
long, but finally they reached their spot and Catra stepped aside to present
them. “The Thundercats of the Feliner,”
she said respectfully to the Horde leader.
Lion-O
took that as his cue to introduce himself in person. “Good to meet you, Hordak,” he greeted
him. “Again we would like to thank you
for your willingness to help.”
“Oh,
it’s no trouble at all,” Hordak said with a pleased grin. “Your Lunar Plundarrian friends are quite a
handful. We have the two we captured in
maximum security. We hadn’t dealt with
their kind before, but we’re satisfied they should be secure for the time
being.”
“Two?”
Panthro repeated, exchanging quick glances with Lion-O and Cheetara. The three of them had the same thought—if the
Horde only had two, perhaps their visit would not be as easy as they had hoped.
Lion-O
frowned somewhat. “Unfortunately there
are six Lunatacs that we’re after. If
you only have two, that means the other four are still at large.”
“Yes,
we’re aware of that,” Mantenna stated, his eyes bulging somewhat as he
spoke. “That was how many of them there
were in Therril earlier.”
“They
wasted no time disturbing the locals, I see,” Cheetara said, shaking her head.
“May
I ask which of the Lunatacs you have, Hordak?”
Hordak
snorted and turned toward Shadow Weaver and Catra. “You two interrogated them, did you get
their names?”
Shadow
Weaver glided to the side of Hordak’s throne.
“I got plenty more than that from the psi, great Hordak,” she said in a
sickly sweet hiss.
Something
in her tone sent chills down Cheetara’s spine, in the same way an encounter
with Mumm-Ra did. The cheetah had a
feeling that member of the Horde had connections to dark magic, although she
remained silent about it. It was not her
place to judge while they were on a foreign planet, and the woman had done
nothing to them—yet. Still, she planned
to watch her back and warn Lion-O and Panthro to do the same regarding
her.
Hordak
raised his arm, which was glowing slightly as it began to shift form into a
gun, much to the surprise of the assembled Thundercats, who had never
encountered a shape-changing alien such as Hordak. He snorted again, making it clear that his
patience was wearing thin. “Stop with
the melodramatic bullshit already, Weaver, and just tell us what you
know.”
“Fine,”
she rasped, annoyance evident in her voice as
well. “The two we have in custody are
called Alluro and RedEye.”
“RrrrredEye is an insolent one,” Catra added with a
snarl. “Most
disobedient and uncooperative. He
had to be, rowr, disciplined.”
“Oh-h-h
yes,” Mantenna piped up with a malicious smirk.
“Span-n-nking and
everything.”
Mantenna’s remark was enough to cause all three Thundercats to do blink in
surprise, especially Panthro, whose eyes seemed to be falling in Catra’s direction as it was. Catra on the other hand did not seem to
appreciate her fellow Horde commander’s remark, and scowling furiously, she
took a step in his direction.
Hordak
failed to see the humor in the situation as well, mostly because he was trying
to give a serious impression to the visiting felines in front of him. Although he was not the type to set out to
impress anyone—aside from Horde Prime or his delegates, perhaps—the Thunderians
might be useful and he certainly did not want his crew to give off any
impression that could be seen as weak or incompetent. In-fighting would most certainly give such an
impression, and he would not tolerate it.
“Mantenna, I think you need to cool off,” Hordak snapped, and pressed a
button on the arm of his throne.
Immediately
a trap door opened beneath the four-legged Horde member and with a squealy protest he disappeared from the throne room before
the infuriated Catra could reach him.
His departure was followed by the sound of a splash and the mechanical
hum of the trap doors closing.
Hordak’s
face relaxed again as he faced the Thundercats, who went from surprised at Mantenna’s remark to stunned at Hordak’s quick disposal of
his commander. “My apologies,” Hordak
said smoothly, as if nothing had happened.
“The tension from dealing with these rebels and this civil war on a
daily basis sometimes leads my crew to forget their manners.”
Lion-O
nodded, still in shock. “Is he—?”
“No,”
Shadow Weaver’s raspy voice answered for the lion.
“It
happens all the time,” Grizzlor said with a shrug. “Just water down there, and stairs in the
back to climb back up.”
The
Thundercats relaxed visibly, and Lion-O and Panthro seemed even amused by
it. Panthro smiled and looked at the
spot Mantenna had been standing in, which visually appeared to not even have
any breaks through which a trap door could be hidden. “I guess that’s one way to relieve stress.”
Cheetara
nodded along with Panthro, and spoke up when the other Thundercat was finished
talking. “But to get back to more
serious matters, Hordak, your associate said that you only had Alluro and
RedEye in custody, right?”
“I
am Shadow Weaver,” the witch introduced herself, “and yes, those were the names
I got from the psi.”
“Then
that means Luna, Amok, Chilla, and TugMug are still free,” Cheetara
finished. “I can’t stress how important
it is that we capture all of them. We
could read you a list of crimes they committed against us, the people of Third
Earth, and CONTROL affiliates—”
“But
you’d be here all night,” Panthro added.
“To sum it up, they’re sneaky, treacherous, two-faced, mercenary,
probably armed and definitely dangerous.”
Catra
nodded. “Their powers are weapons enough
from what we’ve seen, and if they’re consorting with the rebels, they’re
probably armed as well.”
Lion-O
took a few steps forward, as if to stress the importance of what he was about
to say. “You can probably expect to run
into the four of them still at large at some point, although whether or not
they’ll bother to rescue their friends is hard to say. The Lunatacs aren’t especially loyal to
anyone but themselves, but if they feel they have reason, they may come after
you anyway. It would be wise to alert
all of your security here if you haven’t done so already.”
Hordak’s
face remained impassive, although the lion’s assumption that he did not know
how to protect his own fortress irritated him endlessly. Had it not been counter to his purposes, he
would have dunked him in the moat right after Mantenna. As it stood however, that would have to wait,
and he forced a polite tone. “I assure
you, the Fright Zone security is on full alert against rebel attacks at all
times. They tend to try to rescue their
captured allies, and we fully expect something to happen before too long. Whether the rebels care for your fugitives
enough to come after them remains to be seen, but one of the local rebels we captured
with them has been in custody here before and a rescue attempt was made.”
“An
unfortunately successful one,” Shadow Weaver added darkly. “Thanks to that traitorous Adora’s
information no doubt.”
“Adora?”
Panthro questioned.
“The
rebel leader and former Force Captain,” Catra clarified with a slight
growl. “The head of the rebellion was
once one of us.”
The
three Thundercats frowned in disapproval.
With what had happened with Grune, they were all too familiar with the
damage an ally gone bad could do. “A
turncoat?” Cheetara said, shaking her head slightly.
Hordak
saw how the Thundercats reacted to the mention of a traitor and smiled inwardly
while pasting a dramatically sad look on his face for them to see. If he could play on their sympathies, not
only could he use them to help him get his hands on the Lunar Plundarrian
prisoners, but their rebel friends as well.
The cats had the look of trained warriors about them and if he played
his cards right, he could get some assistance for free, and from CONTROL
affiliates to boot. Horde Prime would
certainly get a charge out of that, and that meant he might get a promotion if
it pleased him well enough. If that was
not incentive to play up the sob story of Adora’s turning on the
Horde—something that still infuriated him to that very day—then what was?
“A
betrayal of the deepest kind,” Hordak said with perfectly executed
sadness. “She was like a daughter to
me. I raised her from a young child, and
tried to do the best for her.”
Shadow
Weaver intuitively picked up on Hordak’s game and played along. “We all knew her well. She grew up here in the Fright Zone, cared
for by our staff and trained by Hordak and myself.”
Catra,
Leech, and Grizzlor exchanged glances, assuming that Hordak and Shadow Weaver were
up to some sort of game, but they remained silent. The Thundercats were too enrapt by Hordak and
Shadow Weaver’s tale to notice however.
They barely noticed when the soggy Mantenna came back into the
room. Mantenna also picked up on the
fact that something was going on, and not wanting to get dunked again, merely
stood silently beside Grizzlor—pointedly away
from Catra, in case she was still angry.
“She
was very bright and sharp, she had all the skills of an excellent commander, so
I promoted her to Force Captain,” Hordak told them, his voice heavy with
emotion. “Naturally I trusted her,
thinking of her as a daughter.” At that
he let out a well-acted sob.
Shadow
Weaver glided to Hordak’s side and laid a consoling hand on his shoulder. “It’s all right, my lord,” she offered, her
cold voice sounding strangely sympathetic.
Mantenna
nudged Grizzlor, who rolled his eyes back at the four-legged Hordesman in
silent agreement and amusement at the scene between Hordak and Shadow
Weaver. Fortunately for the two of them,
it escaped the notice of not only the Thundercats, but the “actors” on Hordak’s
throne stage as well.
“Thank
you Weaver,” Hordak said quietly, inwardly both pleased that she was assisting
him in his plan and mildly disturbed that she was picking up on his thoughts so
well and so comfortable making physical contact with him. But if it worked, he supposed he would not
complain. Besides, she floated, so it
was not like he could dump her into the moat, satisfying as it might have been
at times. Instead, he leaned upright
against her arm, allowing Shadow Weaver’s display of “comfort” to add to the
emotion of the scene, and met the concerned eyes of the Thundercat visitors in
front of him—after a very quick and pointed look at the peanut gallery of
Mantenna, Leech, Grizzlor, and Catra.
“Things
went well for a few years after her promotion,” Hordak explained to the
Thundercats, “but then she fell under the influence of some rebels, including
one annoying Eternian named He-Man. When we had him in custody, he seemed to get
to her somehow, and turn her against us.”
He paused, deliberately choking up a little for show, and then
continued. “At one point she decided that
those damned rebels had been the ‘right’ ones all along, and that we were ‘wrong’
and ‘evil’. She even accused Shadow
Weaver of twisting her mind and forcing her to work for us.”
“Ridiculous,
of course,” Shadow Weaver hissed. “I
taught Adora many things, but I never used my magic in such a way on her. I don’t know how she got such a crazy
notion. What reason would I have had to
thrall a child in such a way for so many years?”
Lion-O
frowned. “That doesn’t make sense at
all.”
“Of
course it doesn’t!” Hordak exclaimed miserably.
“And the things she accused us of were insane.”
Shadow
Weaver slid her arm out from behind Hordak and glided down to the foot of his
throne. “Naturally I tried to get
through to the girl, but when I tried, she accused me of trying to control her
mind again and became irrational. At
that point, the rebels had completely turned her against us.”
“What
an awful story,” Cheetara said sympathetically.
“So she left and joined your enemies permanently after that?”
“Yes,”
Catra spoke up. Hordak and Shadow Weaver
immediately looked over sharply, but since the feline commander was playing
along they made no comment or threatening look.
“She deserrrrrted us after that, and I was
promoted to her old position.”
“And
that is why the rebels have been able to invade our base and free their friends
successfully a few times,” Shadow Weaver finished. “Adora knows the Fright Zone inside out, and
she has undoubtedly shared everything she knew with her rebel allies.”
Hordak’s
expression became stern again now that he was satisfied that he had won the
Thundercats’ sympathy. “We’ve changed
our codes and rebuilt some things, but this base as you can see is quite large
and we can’t anticipate everything someone who grew up here might have told
them or what they might plan. We tried
to eliminate all the obvious weaknesses she might exploit, but as I’m sure you
can imagine, you can’t anticipate everything.”
Panthro
growled. “No one anticipates the sort of
damage a traitor like that can cause. I
can see why the Lunatacs wound up with someone like that. Birds of a feather, as the saying goes.”
“Yes,”
Hordak agreed. “But with your help,
Thundercats, I think we could pluck that bird so bald it won’t be able to fly,
don’t you think?”
Lion-O
turned to Cheetara and Panthro for a moment, and when they gave him affirmative
nods, he turned back to Hordak. “We’re
certainly willing to help you, Hordak.
We need the Lunatacs taken back into custody and if we work as a team, I
think we could accomplish that goal. If
that means we help you pick up a few of your troublesome and traitorous rebels
in the process, then let that be our thanks to you for your helping us
recapture the Lunatacs.”
Hordak
smiled widely, showing his red teeth. He
quickly rose to his feet and descended the stairs from his throne to stand
before Lion-O, and offered him his hand in a handshake. “Well then, Lion-O, I would say we have a
deal then.”
“Indeed
we do,” Lion-O said warmly, taking the Horde leader’s hand and shaking it,
sealing the bargain.
Everyone
in the room relaxed visibly for a moment, and then Hordak spoke again. “Let me take this opportunity then to
formally invite you to stay with us in the Fright Zone as our guests for as
long as this mission takes. As far as I’m
concerned you may make yourselves at home here, and my troopers and staff will
see to it that you’re made comfortable.”
“That’s
very gracious of you, Hordak,” Cheetara said graciously. “We appreciate it.”
“No
trouble at all, my dear!” Hordak exclaimed, and then turned to his four
commanders. “Mantenna! You don’t look busy—why don’t you show our
Thunderian guests to their rooms so they can rest a while after their long
trip? We can discuss our plans later.”
Lion-O
smiled. “Thank you, Hordak, that would
be wonderful.”
“Their-r-r
rooms?” he repeated, stepping forward and leaving a puddle behind from where he
had dripped dry. “Of course, great
Hordak.” The four-legged alien motioned
for the Thundercats to follow him and started for the door. “Com-mm-e with me, Thundercats.” The feline trio nodded politely to Hordak and
then fell in step behind Mantenna.
Hordak
returned the nod to the Thundercats and then snorted, remembering something
suddenly. “Oh, and Mantenna…”
The
nervous Mantenna turned around sharply.
“Y-y-yes?”
“Nice rooms.”
“Oh! All right.
Nn-nn-nice rooms,” Mantenna amended with a
smile. It had been a good thing Hordak
clarified the point. Usually “take them
to their rooms” was sarcastic Horde speak for “stick them in a cell somewhere”
and had he messed that up, surely he would have been in the moat again. “Nice rooms” however only had one meaning—the
VIP suites. “This way, Thundercats.”
Lion-O,
Panthro, and Cheetara followed Mantenna out of the throne room and into the
hallway, where the Horde commander led them through a series of twisted
corridors to an elevator. They went up a
few floors and finally wound up in a hallway with several doors. “This here is our most im-mm-pressive
room,” he explained as he opened the door.
“This will be for you, Lord Lion-O.
The troopers will brinn-nn-ng your things from
your ship shortly.”
“Thank
you, Mantenna,” Lion-O replied graciously, eyeing the posh guest room and
finding it very hospitable. “I’m sure
I’ll rest well in here.” With that he
closed the door and went in to rest. Meanwhile
Mantenna opened the next door down.
“Pan-nn-thro, we hope this room will be to
your likin-nn-ng.”
“Looks
great,” Panthro said as he stepped inside.
“Thanks. Cheetara, I’ll see you
in a bit, ok? I can use a nap after that
flight.”
“I
don’t blame you there at all,” Cheetara replied with a light laugh. “A shower and a nap are in my plans too. I’ll see you in a while.”
Panthro
nodded and closed the door, leaving Mantenna and Cheetara in the hallway. Mantenna opened the door beside Panthro’s and
gestured for her to step through.
Cheetara went inside and found the room to be lavishly decorated, like
the others, and very comfortable. “It’s
very nice, Mantenna, thank you,” she said, suddenly somewhat uneasy with the
strange Hordesman. She was not sure why
that was—normally she was not one to judge by appearance—but then she realized
it was because his large eyes hardly seemed to blink at all and they were very
heavily focused on her, almost as if they were analyzing her in some way.
Cheetara, you’re just being
silly, she
told herself. He probably just hasn’t seen a Thunderian before.
“I
think I’ll be very comfortable in here, especially after some time to unwind,”
she finished, smiling politely at him.
“If
not, fee-ee-eel free to call us,” Mantenna
replied. One of his eyes extended on its
antenna slightly, as if studying her once again. “My room is ver-rr-ry
close if you need me. I’ll be happy to
ser-rr-rrve you.”
The alien grinned, almost as if he was leering at her. “Ver-rr-ry happy.”
Mantenna
stared at her for a few more long moments, and then turned and left, closing
the door behind him and leaving her alone.
Cheetara
blinked, somewhat in shock. Was he… hitting on me?
The
cheetah then shook her head. “Don’t be
ridiculous. You’ve just had a long day,”
she admonished herself with a murmur, and then went into the bathroom. Mantenna’s leer
aside, Cheetara still could not shake the feeling that something strange was
going on as she climbed into the shower.
They seemed friendly enough, if not a bit strange, but they were
foreigners to them, and she and the other Thundercats were a long way from New
Thundera.
That has to be it, she decided as the
water relaxed her muscles, sore from the long flight and the stress of worrying
about the situation with the Lunatacs. It’s just stress, nothing more.
* * *
Back
at the rebel camp in the heart of the Whispering Woods the mood was anxious as
the members of the Great Rebellion, including the four
recruited-by-circumstance Lunatacs, gathered in the center to go finalize their
plan of attack. Adora and Bow were at
the head of the crowd and at their side were some individuals they recognized
and a few more they did not. One was a
woman with long sky-blue hair clad in a navy and white outfit accented with a
cape. Beside her was a tall auburn
haired woman, more human looking than some of the Etherians, the only thing
setting her apart from the commoners being her dark blue eye shadow. On the other side of them stood a blond woman
in a pink dress with a rather ridiculous—at least in Luna’s opinion,
anyway—flowered hat and beside her a woman with purple hair and what could only
be described as large and colorful butterfly wings on her back.
It
struck Luna as a bit odd that there seemed to be so many unusual women there,
while many of the men were somewhat nondescript and boring, Bow being the
exception, at least in his clothing. She
was not quite sure what to make of a man who would wear tight pants and a chestplate with a heart design on it with a cape, but then
again some of the Etherians seemed to have very peculiar, to say the least,
fashion sense.
“All
right everyone, it looks like we’re all here,” Adora began, her soft voice
capturing the attention of the crowd with surprising ease. “Time is of the essence here, since we have
to get Peekablue and the Lunatacs’ friends out of the Fright Zone, but first I
think a few introductions are in order.”
“Indeed,”
the tall auburn-haired woman said, stepping forward. “When Bow told me that there were individuals
here from the ancient race, I could hardly believe it, but I had to come see
for myself.” She scanned the crowd until
she saw the four Lunatacs, and studied them intensely for a moment. “And to help my allies in the rebellion, of
course,” she finished.
The
blue-haired woman nodded to the other woman’s words and followed her gaze to
the Lunatacs. She seemed enrapt by all
of them, but her eyes lingered longest on Chilla. “It’s true,” she said quietly. “Unbelievable, but what else could they
be?” She strode confidently over to the
Lunatacs, stopping in front of Chilla.
She bowed respectfully and then spoke.
“I am Empress Frosta of the
Chilla
blinked, not quite sure how to respond.
She was rarely addressed so reverently, and when she was it was
generally someone whom she had just threatened with a deadly icing or burning
doing it. “My name is Chilla, Empress,”
she answered finally, her voice thick with frost, enhancing her natural Second
Moon accent.
Frosta
relaxed and straightened. “You may call
me Frosta, Chilla. If we’re going to
work together, we might as well be on a first name basis. Besides,” the icy Etherian added with a
smirk, “I look forward to talking with you about our people in less stressed
times. I have so many questions I would
love to ask when the time is right.”
The
blond woman in the strange hat spoke up next.
Her voice had an extremely upbeat lilt to it, to the point where all the
Lunatacs save Amok got the impression of an airhead with her first
sentence. “Oh yes, I would love to speak
with you too,” she said brightly. “I’m
Perfuma. Some of my ancestors were from
your dark moon, but unlike Glimmer’s they were horticulturalists.”
“Horti-whats?” TugMug asked.
“Horticulturalists,
dearie,” Madame Razz clarified for him.
“Perfuma’s powers make the plants grow in any
condition. She keeps the Whispering
Woods strong, no matter what the weather, season, and even in total
darkness. We know, because the Horde has
tried all those things to get rid of our trees.”
Luna
harrumphed from atop Amok. “You’d think
that a large enough saw would solve that problem for them. Are the Horde leaders really that stupid?”
“Oh
that Hordikins is a character, but he’s not stupid,”
Perfuma said with a shrug.
“Hordikins?” Chilla repeated incredulously.
Several
of the rebellion members laughed.
“That’s not quite his name, Chilla,” Bow said with a grin. “But it stuck after Perfuma started calling
him that. Actually his name is Hordak.”
Luna
frowned, looking at Perfuma curiously again.
“So you’re related to a darkling, but your powers make plants
thrive? I don’t know of any darklings with such powers.
That must be something in the Etherian blood.”
“Many
Etherians were born with a gift of magic even before your kind set foot on the
planet,” the tall auburn woman said in a low and husky voice. “When bloodlines mix, strange results can
occur. Some like myself became gifted
magic users in conjunction with the Lunar Plune-daren
mind powers, but back in Mystacor there are many
books detailing the evolution of some of the more prominent clans’ powers. Naturally the psi ones are most well
established there, it being a psi colony in the ancient times.” She folded her arms and then eyed the
Lunatacs again. “But there are no psis among you, are there?
I would recognize it if you were, I’m sure. But I forget my manners, I haven’t introduced
myself properly,” she said, her voice softening somewhat. “I am Queen Castaspella of Mystacor.”
“Luna
of the Lunatacs of Plundarr, and my
“I
look forward to meeting them, especially your psi, once we get them freed,”
Castaspella replied smoothly. “You must
be a lunar,” she guessed. “With a brute,
even. Brutes were among the first to be
lost over the generations here. Only the
oldest of existing artwork still depicts them accurately,” the sorceress said
softly. “And Chilla, most obviously an
icewalker.” She glanced at TugMug. “And you must be a graviton.”
TugMug
flashed Castaspella a wide, toothy grin full of pride. “One hundred percent, all graviton.”
“One
hundred and twenty is more like it,” Luna quipped with a roll of her eyes at
the stout Lunatac.
Chilla
let out a snicker in spite of herself. “And
at least twenty percent ass at that.”
Bow
and several others in the crowd laughed good-naturedly. “I’m glad to see the four of you haven’t lost
your sense of humor. Sometimes that’s
all that gets us through these hard times.”
Castaspella
smiled politely at the exchange of wisecracks but continued the conversation
with TugMug in a more serious vein.
“Very few with a noticeable amount of your blood still exist at all on
Etheria. Though you occasionally see it
in the strongest of the men,” she said, eyeing one of the burlier Etherian men
in the crowd, who smiled.
“Makes
you wonder if He-Man is Etherian and related somewhere down the line as opposed
to being Eternian then,” Frosta said with a knowing
smirk.
“You
and your He-Man,” the butterfly woman said just loud enough to be heard,
causing Perfuma to giggle uncontrollably.
“Maybe,
you never know,” Adora said dismissively, stepping forward. “And I hate to cut off the pleasantries, but
we should get down to business now that we’re better acquainted. Time is of the essence and the important
thing is getting Peekablue and—” she glanced at Luna for the names of her
friends.
Luna’s
eyes narrowed slightly, but she kept her tone even. “Alluro and RedEye.”
Adora
nodded. “Right. Peekablue, Alluro, and RedEye are counting on
us to get them out of there. We all know
how brutal the Horde can be, so we can’t waste time.” The rebel leader then turned to Glimmer. “Glimmer, where’s Queen Angella?”
“I’m
sorry,” the pink-haired girl replied.
“Mother couldn’t make it. She
said she could come if we need the back up and it’s urgent, but things have
been uneasy in Bright Moon lately with more frequent Horde trooper
invasions. She doesn’t want to leave the
castle unprotected unless it’s absolutely necessary, and she said she hoped
that I could do enough for the both of us.”
“I
understand,” Adora said with a nod.
Bow
looked around, as if looking for someone else who had not shown up. “Adora, what about She-Ra? Were you able to get in touch with her?” Sometimes he wondered why it was that She-Ra
only trusted Adora and Madame Razz with her contact information after all that
they had been through. He supposed it
was important that someone as powerful as she keep her home a secret, but at
times he felt it would be really convenient if she would trust a few more of
the rebellion, especially the ones that had proven themselves trustworthy.
“Briefly,
yes, but she can’t come right away. She
promised to meet us there and said she would definitely lend a hand as soon as
she could,” Adora assured him.
“We
have quite a force here, but She-Ra’s backup certainly wouldn’t hurt,” Frosta
said. “So where and when do we strike?”
Adora
strode to the center of the crowd and waited until she had everyone’s attention,
and then outlined her plan. “We’re going
to enter the Fright Zone from the sewer tunnels on the southwest side. I don’t believe they’ve been properly sealed
or guarded. We weren’t followed the last
time we used that route, so I don’t think Hordak realizes it’s vulnerable to
the outside yet,” she explained, pacing slightly as she spoke. “Once there, we’ll divide into smaller groups
to spread across the dungeons and search out Peekablue, Alluro, and RedEye. We all know Peekablue, and I’m sure the two
Lunatacs will be easy enough to spot.”
There
were nods of concurrence throughout the crowd, and then Adora continued. “From there we break them out and make a run
for the exit. This is going to be a
quick and dirty mission, and I’d rather not trip any alarms or have any
confrontations with Horde commanders if possible. We can do damage to the Fright Zone another
time. Right now the important thing is
their safety, and getting them out of there.”
She
looked over the eyes of the crowd. “Is
everyone clear on that?” When she heard
no argument she put her hands on her hips authoritatively and smiled
satisfactorily. “Good. We leave in ten minutes. Get your weapons and assemble on the eastern
border of the Whispering Woods.”
The
crowd broke apart, and the four Lunatacs exchanged looks with one another. “Do you think we should trust her, Luna?”
Chilla said, eyeing Adora suspiciously.
“She
and her people are willing to help us, so I say we take it. As much as Alluro and RedEye may not deserve
us saving their hides, no Lunatac should be subjected to such disrespect from a
bunch of arrogant fools such as these Horde officials,” Luna said
haughtily. “Besides, these people think
of us almost like living gods or legends.
Why shouldn’t we let them help us?”
Chilla
nodded, agreeing for once with Luna’s logic.
“I will say that it’s a nice change from being demeaned by that
worthless circus fool and those damned Thundercats.”
“Besides,”
TugMug added, bouncing with anticipation, “it’ll be fun to kick the shit out of
those Horde losers after what happened back in the village.”
“Smash
Horde,” Amok growled in agreement.
“Yes,
boy,” Luna said with a vicious gleam in her eye. “Smash them to bits.”
* * *
Miserable
and unaware that there were plans in place for the rescue of himself and the
others, Alluro sat silently on the floor of his cell, his back to the cold and
damp stone wall of the dungeon. It had
been less than a standard day’s worth of hours since Shadow Weaver had invaded
his mind, but it felt to the psi like days, longer than his entire imprisonment
on Way Out Back. I never thought I’d think back on that hellhole and remember it fondly
in comparison, he mused disgustedly.
His
thoughts alternately shifted from depressed, defeated, and self-loathing for
allowing that witch to overpower and violate him—Alluro, Master of the Mind—in
such a way, to sheer and unbridled hatred for his mental rapist. Alluro was not one given to displaying or
even allowing himself to indulge in feeling extremes of emotion—few psis did because of the way emotional states could cloud
and affect their mental powers—but after what he had just been through, his
hatred of Shadow Weaver and the entire Horde to only a slightly lesser degree
was all that was keeping him from going insane.
Escape
seemed impossible. The cells were quite
secure, the walls thick and the locks crude but effective at keeping the
prisoners inside. He lamented the fact
that he had never learned telekinetic abilities that would allow him to pick
the locks. His powers of persuasion were
of little use against the robot sentinels posted all throughout the dungeon,
even if he still had his psyche club, which he did not.
That thrice damned witch has
it, he
thought angrily, scowling in a manner that if one could have seen his face his
normally haughty features would have looked unusually vicious. If he saw her with it, he intended to focus
every bit of the mental energy he could muster to make the ball explode in her
hands. Not that being cut or burned
could make her any uglier, for what little he had seen of her shadowed face
seemed every bit as hideous to him as the twisted darkness of her soul, but it
would be spitefully satisfying nonetheless.
The
fantasy of exacting revenge upon Shadow Weaver imagined in vivid detail was but
one of the thoughts that circulated in his mind in that lonely and dark
dungeon. When he grew tired of that, his
thoughts shifted to desperately imagining some way, any way, that he might escape. Inevitably that only lasted a short while
before giving way to the harsh truth that escape was not just highly unlikely,
but near the realm of impossible. Adding
the desire to free RedEye and Peekablue plus teach Shadow Weaver a grim lesson
brought it to the level of ridiculous, which served only to remind him of the
vivid and depressing reality of his situation… which brought him back to how
much he hated Shadow Weaver and how he wanted to see her suffer once again.
Once
or twice Alluro had tried to close his eyes and sleep, but sleeping for more
than short naps had proved impossible.
While the small cell was physically uncomfortable for any prisoner, it
was worse for someone of his towering stature, as he had to hunch to stand at
full height and had to draw up his knees to lie down or he would hit the
wall. The chill and dampness made his
joints ache, and the grit and grime coating every surface of the cell made him
feel dirty physically on top of mentally—which he had felt ever since Shadow Weaver
had violated his mind in her rending.
That
was only part of it, though. The other
reason he could not sleep was a simpler one.
He just could not let his mental guard down long enough to sleep more
than his body absolutely demanded. He
did not want to wake up again on that witch’s table at her mercy and
ill-prepared for it. His pride simply
would not allow it.
Alluro
had spent some of the time he was languishing in his cell productively to use
what energy he had to strengthen his mental barriers. He had not expected to run into a Horde
member with Shadow Weaver’s level of power and had hence been unprepared for
her initial attack, but he would be damned if she would be able to take him
again so easily. For hours he had sat in
an almost catatonic state shutting out everything around him, but eventually he
began to come out of it when he was reasonably sure she was not trying to
invade him telepathically from afar.
Maintaining
the state of mental blackout was not easy and had worn him out, so it came as a
relief to his psyche when he finally relaxed it. Still, his nervousness lingered for a good
half hour afterward until nothing adverse came from him letting his guard
down. It was then that he wondered if he
should try to reach RedEye or even Peekablue telepathically. All psis had some
natural telepathic abilities, although in him it was half-assed at best. True mind-speech was a practice that came
easily only to full empaths, and he was only as empathic as his mesmeriziation abilities demanded he be. After all, it was rather counter-productive
to sense another’s emotional motivations, manipulate them to suit his needs,
and then be forced to feel the
confusion he was deliberately causing in his subject.
As
a result, Alluro could respond telepathically to a mind link easily enough but
initiating one was another story. Even
if he could forge one, RedEye was about as psychic as the rock his cell was
constructed from and would at best only be able to hear him, not respond,
unless somehow he could pick up on the darkling’s responding thoughts on his
own. Peekablue on the other hand he knew
to have psi blood from what he had heard during the exchange with Hordak and
from what Shadow Weaver had gloated about, but he had no idea how Etherian
powers worked and what hers entailed other than those of a seer. Seers were no more empaths than mesmerizers, and he barely knew her, so forging a mind link
with the Etherian was a long shot as well even if she did have some sort of
telepathic ability.
Alluro
debated the pros and cons of attempting a mind link with either of them for
several minutes as he sat there in the darkness. If it worked, he would not only have friendly
conversation to keep him sane, but also they might be able to pool their
information and formulate some plan of escape.
Even if that did not pan out, he would at least have someone to
commiserate with. Somehow the idea of
confirming that he was not the only one of the three of them abused in one way
or another by a Horde member comforted him.
Perhaps it was the knowledge that he would not feel so terribly alone
and weak.
The
psi then went over the negatives in attempting a mind link. To even attempt to establish a psychic
connection with another mind meant opening his up and severely lowering his
guard. If, gods forbid, Shadow Weaver
was practiced in her empathic abilities and she picked up on his weakness, she
could violate his mind again. That
thought made him feel almost physically ill, and he did not think he could
retain his sanity if such a thing were to happen to him again.
He
went back and forth several times over the positives and negatives before his
desperation to do something finally quashed his ailing ego and pride,
convincing that part of himself that if he did nothing he would certainly never
get anywhere closer to out, and the damned Horde would still have gotten the
better of him. The mere thought galled
him, and riled up enough of his hatred to overshadow his fear and urge him to
try at least once.
Alluro
took a deep breath and sat up straighter, drawing his knees close to his chest
and circling his arms around them. It
was a centering exercise, something that helped him to shake off any outside
influences or emotions that might interfere with his attempt by focusing on his
physical body. He sat like that for
several long moments and then slowly stretched his legs out and realigned
himself into a more meditative position.
The psi then sat up straight, sitting with good posture, raised his chin
slightly, and closed his eyes. Slowly he
cleared his mind and then relaxed his mental barriers to feel out his
surroundings.
At
first he was cautious, ready to withdraw and barricade in his psyche at the
first sensation of Shadow Weaver or anything resembling her dark and sadistic
presence. When he felt nothing
threatening, he reached further, and then further when nothing bad came of
that. He decided to try and reach RedEye
first. While he was by far the less
likely to be psychic of the choice of him or Peekablue, Alluro knew RedEye far
better on a personal level. From what he
knew of his own limited experience in mind-speech, that was more important a
factor in establishing a successful link than anything else. RedEye’s presence was one he would be able to
sense more easily than one of someone he had just met.
Then
it happened. As he was reaching out with
his mind, he felt the sense of someone angry and familiar to him. The soul was not close in proximity to him
physically, which Alluro guessed to mean that he was located in a different
corridor as his powers simply did not reach over any sort of real
distance. The personality it was
distinctly masculine, logical, and meticulous in his thinking. Alluro picked up on a trace of bitter sarcasm
that rang true to the somewhat quirky and dark sense of humor he had seen
RedEye display on occasion and it flashed a brief but intense impulse of hatred
toward all things feline. That had to be RedEye, Alluro reasoned, and
he decided to take his chance and try to broadcast a telepathic message to him
before he lost his concentration or his confidence.
“RedEye,” Alluro projected
psychically with as much strength as he could.
“RedEye, can you hear me?”
The
psi waited with intense anticipation for several moments only to hear absolutely
nothing in response. The other soul’s
energy was still there, and he could feel it becoming clouded with confusion,
but he could not read anything concrete from it in the form of a response or
even a coherent thought.
“If you can hear me, RedEye,
think back to me. Communicate with your
mind.”
Still
nothing.
Alluro
did his best to quell a depressing defeatist sentiment that began to rise
within him. It was an inner voice that
had gained far too much strength for the normally confident hypnotist’s liking
after what Shadow Weaver had done to him.
Damn that bitch, damn her to the
most gods-forsaken voids of darkness, he thought bitterly. I hate her…
With
some effort, Alluro shook off the force of his own hatred for Shadow Weaver and
took command of his emotions long enough to try once again. “RedEye,
if you can hear me, answer,” he projected forcefully, his voice taking on
an irritated and anxious edge. He
inhaled sharply and forced himself to remain calm, but when once again no
answer was forthcoming after several long moments, the negativity and
hopelessness within his own psyche began to loom once more.
“Damn you RedEye, answer
me!”
The
presence he believed to be RedEye became muddled to him as his temper rose, and
Alluro felt nothing but intense confusion and frustration being added to the
mix, clouding his own emotions.
Untrained as his empathic abilities were, Alluro did not know how to
stop foreign emotions from muddling his own without severing the connection
entirely, and the intensity of the other soul’s negative emotions had become
poisonous to his own psyche to the point where he could no longer focus
clearly.
Alluro’s
frustration reached the point of rage, and he let out an incoherent psychic
yell with what energy he had left.
Almost immediately afterward, the more rational aspect of his mind
filled with recriminations and fears of how incredibly stupid that had
been—what if Shadow Weaver heard that and came for him again, sensing weakness?
The
thought was enough to send the shell-shocked hypnotist crashing back into the
cold reality of his cell and out of his trance altogether, shaking visibly at
the thought of her forcing her way into his mind, touching his memories,
helping herself to his thoughts against his will again.
I hate her, Alluro thought miserably as
he slouched back against the wall again.
Hate her, hate her, hate her…
The
thoughts were far less eloquent that anything the hypnotist would articulate
had someone asked him in person, but alone in his thoughts he had no one to
impress but his own ego, and that aspect of him was still quite badly
wounded. Perhaps that fact was what
drove him to such vehement and intense hatred of Shadow Weaver most of all.
Exhausted
from the mental energy spent on his failed telepathic mission and the demotivating feelings of failure, Alluro embraced his
hatred and anger as something to keep him sane and safe and closed his
eyes. He believed it only a dream or
wishful thinking when the edges of his now very closed-off psyche picked up on
a small and distant voice calling to him.
Determined not to fall for one of Shadow Weaver’s cruel tricks he shut
it out entirely and lapsed into a fitful sleep.
* * *
In
the adjacent corridor in a cell near the end of the hallway, RedEye stood with
some effort in his cell, leaning against the wall and scowling furiously. He was still in considerable pain from the
encounter with Catra, his wounds now raw and inflamed from being exposed to the
dirty environment without medical attention.
That
was not what RedEye was thinking about at that moment however. His head was still buzzing from the
ear-piercing psychic bellow Alluro had let out a short while earlier. He had no idea what it was the psi had been
trying to accomplish in blasting him mentally, but he had been loud and the
darkling did not particularly appreciate Alluro pushing his way into his head
the way he had.
At
first when he had heard Alluro’s voice, RedEye had looked around thinking the
psi had somehow escaped his own prison and found his way to the door of his
cell. He had heard him as loud and clear
as if he had been right there, but to RedEye’s complete shock he was nowhere to
be seen—not in the cell and not in the hallway anywhere he could see with his
enhanced vision. A scan of the area
confirmed the presence of a few other prisoners in his hall, and heat
signatures of some in the corridors beyond on either side, but those were
distant and difficult to identify on a personal basis. The only heat signature he had spotted that
was tall enough to fit Alluro’s description was in the next hallway over, but
if that was Alluro, then how was it that he could have heard him so close?
When
he had heard him the second time, it was louder, as if the hypnotist had been
standing right beside him. He was not
there, of course, and RedEye then realized that he was hearing Alluro in his
head. The darkling wondered for a brief
moment if he was going crazy. He had
never been spoken to telepathically before, by Alluro or anyone else, but he supposed
that being a psi Alluro might know telepathy and just never have used it with
him or any of the others prior. RedEye
had a rather limited understanding of the intricacies of psi disciplines and
what those of each discipline could or could not do beyond their
specialty. He knew only that some of
them could do mind-speech.
Unfortunately
Alluro’s success at reaching him with a telepathic link ended there, for RedEye
had absolutely no clue as to how to answer him.
Think back to you? Communicate with my mind? RedEye had wondered, thinking as forcefully
as he could, not even sure if Alluro could hear it or not. How the
hell do I do that?
He
discovered soon enough that his answer must not have gotten through to the psi,
because a few moments later he had heard Alluro’s voice even louder in his
head, that time pushier and obviously more irate.
“I’d
answer you if I could,” RedEye growled aloud in a low tone. He dared not speak louder lest he rouse the
suspicion of the robotic troopers nearby, but he was getting frustrated. He was
thinking back to Alluro, at least in the only way he knew how. If the hypnotist could not hear him, then
maybe he ought to give better instructions on how to do it. He was not a damned psi, after all.
It
was moments later, while RedEye was still irritably puzzling as to how in the
name of the Moons he was supposed to answer Alluro in mind-speech, that he
heard Alluro’s psychic holler, loud enough in his head to give one of Luna’s
full-volume shrieks a run for their money.
After that, he heard only silence.
Finally the darkling came to the conclusion that Alluro became
frustrated and gave up.
Thanks a lot, Alluro, that
had a point, didn’t it? RedEye thought bitterly. As if that feline whore hadn’t made me miserable
enough already, you have to add to it by imitating one of Luna’s tantrums. Luna.
Gods, RedEye would even be glad to see her at that point, he realized,
and that was a very depressing realization.
He generally avoided spending time around Luna whenever possible.
When
his head stopped throbbing, he walked over to the edge of his cell and peered
through the dingy barred section.
Although with his vision he could see heat signatures through the stone,
he was able to get a better view with nothing obscuring it. He was not sure exactly what he was looking
for, but nonetheless he looked up and down the halls. Nothing had changed. No one was there. Not Alluro, not the bird-woman, and certainly
not the other Lunatacs.
Just me and the troopers, he thought bitterly, and
sat back down on the hard stone floor to wallow in his misery some more.
* * *
The
hastily-assembled rebel gathering assembled in a tight circle behind a series
of large boulders that sat upon a hill just north of the Fright Zone. Adora was toward the center of the crowd,
giving them last minute instructions.
“All right,” she addressed the group in a somewhat rushed tone. “We’re going to go in together and when the
tunnel forks split into three groups, one for each direction. Glimmer, I would like you, Castaspella,
Perfuma, and TugMug to take the left turn.”
TugMug
grinned as he eyed the trio of women that would accompany him. “All right!” he said, his statement more one
of delight than actual acknowledgement of an order. Castaspella only nodded, and ignored the
graviton’s leer while Glimmer and Perfuma remained blissfully ignorant of it
and voiced their willingness to comply with Adora’s suggestion.
Adora
turned toward Bow. “Bow, I’d like you to
lead Frosta and Chilla down the right corridor.”
“Will
do, Adora,” Bow agreed, while Frosta joined his side with a quiet nod. Chilla silently went over to where the
ice-born Etherian stood, both relieved and mildly annoyed at her assignment. She was relieved to have been placed on a
team with one of the Etherians descended from her Lunatac bloodline and a man
she had seen show skill in combat, but it annoyed her that she would not have
any of the other Lunatacs, whom she knew far better, with her and that her
group’s leader, despite being an asset in battle, seemed a touch too friendly
with her for her liking.
“The
third group that will take the center route will be led by She-Ra when she gets
here. Madame Razz, I’d like you to lead
Luna and Amok inside, and I’ll direct She-Ra in when she gets here,” Adora
finished, and glanced at the sky. “I
suppose she was detained, but I trust she’ll be here very soon. She’s never let us down before.”
Madame
Razz reached for Broom and motioned for Luna and Amok to join her. “Sure thing, dearie.”
Luna
frowned as she and Amok took their place beside Madame Razz and Broom. “You seem to place a lot of faith in this
She-Ra for someone that can’t even show up on time,” the lunar woman stated
grouchily.
Bow
cast the tiny Lunatac an encouraging smile.
“You’ll change your mind when you see her in action. She-Ra’s one of the best allies you could ask
for. Trust me.”
“Lunatacs
trust only what they know to be true,” Chilla stated with a dubious look at the
Etherian archer.
“There
will be time for this debate later,” Frosta interrupted. “In the meantime, let’s get underway. The longer we stay out here, the more likely
we are to be spotted by a Horde patroller.”
Glimmer
nodded in agreement and turned to her team.
“Right. Come on guys, we’ll head
in first.” With that the pink-haired
Etherian stepped into the tunnel that led into the Fright Zone. Castaspella and Perfuma followed closely
behind, and TugMug went in immediately after.
Bow then raised his arm and motioned for Frosta and Chilla to follow
him, and entered the tunnel a few moments after Glimmer’s group went in. Finally Madame Razz nudged Broom to lead her
into the dark opening, and a hesitant Luna prodded Amok to follow while Adora turned
and took a few steps toward the hill nearby, presumably to look for She-Ra.
On
their way in, the rebel group’s pace quickened, and wanting to follow his
mistress’ orders to the best of his ability, Amok hurried to keep up with Broom
and Madame Razz. Unfortunately, in his
haste the brute misjudged the height of the comparatively narrow tunnel and
neglected to notice that his rider would not clear the top by a good six
inches. Luna noticed her steed’s error
in judgment a moment too late and did not even have the time to let out a yelp
of warning when the concrete struck her square in the forehead, toppling her
off of his back and causing her to fall back on the ground with an awkward but
muffled thud.
A
moment after Luna hit the ground and she opened her mouth to call for Amok, a
bright light from behind flashed in her peripheral vision. Instinctively the Lunatac whirled her head
around and saw a shocking sight. It was
Adora—only not quite Adora a moment later—holding up a shining silver sword
with a crystal in its base, surrounded by a shimmering aura of light. In a flash the Adora that had stood there and
ordered them all inside was gone, replaced by a more imposing and striking
version of the rebellion leader. Her
blond hair lengthened, her posture and build radiated a sense of indestructibility,
and even her red and white clothes were replaced with a white mini-dress,
boots, and a headpiece that framed her lovely face. It was then that Luna noticed the expression
on the changed Adora’s face, one equally surprised and shocked as the one on
her own.
Both
Luna and the altered Adora remained locked in their startled gazes for several
moments, barely aware that Amok, Madame Razz, and Broom had come out of the
tunnel seconds after Adora’s transformation was complete. Amok picked up his missing mistress and
replaced her on his back while Madame Razz pieced together instantly what had
happened, and what Luna must have seen, when she saw the look on the lunar
woman’s face and She-Ra standing there.
“Dearie
my,” was all Madame Razz could manage to say when she realized that Adora had
just inadvertently given away She-Ra’s secret identity to one of the newest
members of the Great Rebellion.
To Be Continued
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