Revival
(Revised Edition, January 2009)
by Cheezey
Part One: Memories
Gathered in the MoonTower’s observatory were Luna, Amok, Chilla, and TugMug along with their lunar royal hosts Queen Selene and Prince Silvian. It had only taken a few short questions for Selene to determine Luna’s exact familial tie to her and Silvian, although for simplicity’s sake she dubbed her newfound relation “Aunt Luna” as it was easier than detailing it out. The queen and prince courteously extended an invitation for Luna and her group to stay with them in the MoonTower until they were settled in the capitol area. Although the royalty and their court habitually greeted all strangers to the area, especially armed ones, personally for security reasons, ones deemed friendly newcomers to the area were usually shuffled along to an inn or surplus military housing if temporary accommodations were required. Being Selene and Silvian’s relative, however, earned Luna a place of honor, ironically in much the way Psiarik had earlier been concerned that a con artist would. Fortunately for them Luna was genuine, at least insofar as being who she said she was, and the Lunatacs agreed to obey the local laws and mind the royal authority in exchange for a pardon for their shady pasts.
For the time being, Luna was content enough to pay lip service and humor them. Selene and Silvian were hospitable, and they certainly treated her with more respect than their parents ever had, so she would honor their wishes for the time being. Family bonding had never been a high priority of hers, but she had nothing against the notion either, especially since the royal siblings were being generous. The MoonTower was by far the nicest accommodations they had had in a long time.
After they had been speaking for a while, Frostor joined them, bringing Alluro, RedEye, and Vultureman with him. “Greetings,” he said to the assembled group. “Guess who wanted to come and say ‘hi’ to some old friends?”
“Caw, well I wouldn’t go so far as to call them ‘friends’, but hello anyway, Luna.”
Luna sneered. “I wouldn’t go half that far, feather-head. I can’t believe you turned up on my home moon amongst my kin of all places. Unbelievably small, this universe.”
The vulture’s beak twisted into a sarcastic smile. “Not that small. It’s big enough that you’ve managed to last all these years without coming up on the unfriendly end of a blaster. I’m surprised that your group didn’t run afoul of someone with better weapons yet.”
“Leave it to the bird brain to talk about fowl,” TugMug wisecracked, much to the amusement of Chilla, RedEye, and Alluro.
Vultureman chose not to dignify the graviton with an acknowledgment. “So where have you been since Way Out Back?”
“All over, but nowhere worth staying very long,” Luna said. “So what made you choose to stay here rather than return to Plundarr with your old pals?”
The vulture lifted his beak into the air in a haughty manner. “Slythe and the others never appreciated my genius. I might’ve gotten some respect amongst the other vultures, but they’re terrible at getting anything done as far as getting the rats, reptilians, and the others to listen to them. I don’t have the patience for that.”
“And we pay better, too,” Frostor said with a knowing grin. “Brilliant or not, disaffected rogues with a history of CONTROL detainment aren’t prime employment candidates in the Plundarrian military and science community.”
“That too,” Vultureman admitted, folding his arms crossly at having that annoying fact pointed out.
“Anyhow, I have something I’d like to bring up,” Frostor told Selene and Silvian in a serious tone. “I meant to bring it up earlier, but the arrival of Luna and her friends here caused such a stir that we forgot.”
Vultureman cackled. “Luna’s always had a knack for stirring things up.”
“Isn’t that the truth?” Alluro chortled in agreement.
“Ordinarily I’d classify this, but I think given the unique circumstances of your group and what I know of your tenure on Third Earth from Vultureman, you have experience with the other artifacts in the class of what I’m about to tell you about, so I’ll include you on it. You six weren’t the only ones that made an appearance out of the past recently.”
“You must be talking about this,” Psiarik’s voice sounded from the archway leading in from the adjoining hall. The psi held out the MoonSaber while he and a darkling woman with a shoulder-length lock of ruby-tinted black hair that looked to be about ten years his senior strode into the room. “Sorry about taking off with it earlier. I was mad and not thinking clearly.”
Silvian snorted. “You’re never thinking, clearly or not.”
Psiarik shot the lunar prince a dirty look while Selene came over to him. “I was worried! Where did you go?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“I found him feeling sorry for himself outside,” the darkling woman said. “I dragged him back in here.”
After giving her a nod, Selene took it upon herself to introduce her to the rest of the group. “By the way, this is Lushara. She’s another member of our court and a good friend of ours. She’s been with us since the beginning, one of the survivors from the capitol. Lushara, these are Luna and—”
“Psiarik filled me in on who they are,” Lushara said, casting her eyes toward Luna’s crew. “Some more than others,” she added, eyeing Alluro, before her glance fell on RedEye, a pleasant surprise. There were not all that many dark-dwellers in the area and none that were eligible men her age. She smiled at him, and RedEye, apparently finding the woman of his race a welcome sight as well, smiled back.
Frostor took the MoonSaber from Psiarik and handed it to Selene. “This is what I wanted to talk to you about. A mine worker on Lixuvekh found this in one of the tunnels encased in blue ice with odd properties, perhaps supernatural ones given what this is. It’s been missing for over fifty years, but I’m convinced this is it given where it turned up and what I know about the circumstances of its disappearance. It’s the legendary MoonSaber.”
Almost every Lunatac in the room gasped. “The MoonSaber!” Luna exclaimed. “The legendary sword of Luran the Conqueror? Are you sure?”
“Sure as I can be without asking Luran himself,” Frostor said. “I’ve seen many drawings and depictions of it in my time. It certainly looks like it, and I can’t imagine that someone would go through all the trouble to bury a false one in the mountains of the ice moon.”
“Gods, the lost sword… do you know what this means to us?” Silvian said, his eyes alit with excitement. “The kind of power we have now?”
Psiarik looked from Selene to Silvian, and then to Frostor and Luna, with a dubious expression. “Does everyone know about this freakin’ sword but me?”
“Don’t mock its power!” Silvian berated him. “This is our birthright. Both our parents and our governess told us about this, and how if it was ever found from where our grandfather had the sorceress Chillandra hide it, that it would be our responsibility to hold and wield it for the good of the Moons.”
“Okay, sorry, but really, I didn’t know,” Psiarik said.
Selene carefully turned the sword over in her hands, studying its detail, and spent a moment eyeing the luminous moonstone in the handle. “King Mallar had Chillandra hide this sword for a reason. Grandfather was worried about some prophecy that it could be used with the Plundarrians’ and Thunderians’ swords to bring great destruction in the wrong hands. Now that it’s been found, what do we do with it?”
Silvian extended his hand to his sister for the sword, and she handed it to him. As soon as he took hold of it, the prince found it felt natural in his hands. The blade hummed ever so subtly with what he knew to be incredible power. “We use it to protect ourselves and our Moons, what it was meant for.”
“Incredible,” Lushara said softly. “I’d always thought that story about Chillandra hiding the MoonSaber was embellished for the sake of dramatics, to make a good tale for children to feel safe at night. Kind of like the warnings my parents gave me about the trickster moon fairies of the dark moon forests.”
“I’m sure some of the tales got a bit tall over the years, but there are plenty of historical accounts documenting the sword’s use, and if they hadn’t been destroyed with the palace, I’d bet there were classified files about it dating from Mallar’s reign,” Frostor said. “And given that we know for a fact that the Sword of Plundarr and Sword of Omens have such impressive powers also, why not our MoonSaber?”
“Should we heighten security in light of this? Do you think someone might attempt to take it, like that Thundercat did fifty years ago?” asked Selene.
Putting his arm around his wife’s shoulders, Psiarik reassured her, “If they do, they’re toast. Regardless of the sword’s legend or history, nobody’s going to take what’s ours with all we’ve gone through to get it. You can count on that.”
“Absolutely,” Silvian echoed, now holding the MoonSaber proudly as if it had always belonged to him. “I’m as good as invincible with this in my hands. I’ve got equal power to the Mutant Warrior King and the Lord of the Thundercats. With our sword back in the hands they belong in, no Mutant or Thundercat will get away with threatening us ever again.”
Vultureman let out a low caw to interrupt. “Actually, no Mutant Warrior King has had the Sword of Plundarr for years. Much as I’m sure Ratar-O would like it, he doesn’t have it. Mumm-Ra the Ever-Living does.”
Luna frowned. “We heard that wretched bag of bones was defeated years ago.”
“Yeah, probably the only thing the Thundercats ever did that we’d thank them for,” TugMug added with a sneer.
“You Lunatacs ought to know by now that Mumm-Ra has a, caw, annoying habit of turning up even after he’s been defeated.” Vultureman cocked his head to one side. “And given that I know for a fact that Ratar-O still doesn’t have the Sword of Plundarr means that it’s somewhere not on Plundarr—probably still on New Thundera, in Mumm-Ra’s pyramid. We would know if the Thundercats had it.”
“Given what the Sword of Plundarr did to Thundera last time, I imagine they wouldn’t touch it with a staff ten times the length of Cheetara’s given the chance,” RedEye theorized.
“Or at the very least they wouldn’t keep it,” Luna agreed. “Lion-O is too ‘honorable’ to steal, or so he’d have everyone believe. He would’ve made some announcement about how they were keeping it for the greater good, or some nonsense, if they had it.”
With a nod, Vultureman finished with a note of impatience, “which is precisely why I’m telling you that I’d bet a heap of intergalactic credits that Mumm-Ra still has it.”
Selene looked again at the sword in her brother’s hands. “So if Mumm-Ra has the Sword of Plundarr, how would that play into the legend? If he’s an enemy of the Thundercats and has the Mutants’ sword, is he allied with them? Is he only against the Thundercats, or are we his enemy also?”
“He’s no ally of the Mutants,” Vultureman said with disgust. “That mummy’s double-crossed us more than once, just like he has Luna and her crew.” The Lunatacs nodded in agreement to what the vulture said. “Mumm-Ra is allied with only one being—Mumm-Ra.”
“And without our MoonSaber and the Sword of Omens, there’s little he could do as far as the ancient magical incantations go anyway, I suppose,” mused Selene. A wistful smile crossed her lips. “And there was a part of the legend that said that we could also use them to unite in peace. There’s something to be said for putting an end to the old wars once and for all.”
“You want peace with the Thundercats? The miserable felines that persecuted and harassed us back on Third Earth, and had us locked up on a circus train run by a two-bit con man that paid off someone in CONTROL for the privilege of keeping ‘criminals’ for his own profit?” an incredulous Luna exclaimed.
Taken somewhat aback by the vehemence in Luna’s tone, Selene gave her relation a sympathetic and sheepish look, while TugMug continued Luna’s train of thought. “And make friends with those stupid, worthless Mutants?”
“Caw!” Vultureman started to protest, but Alluro cut him off.
“Oh, present company is excluded, of course, Vultureman.” The sarcastic lilt in the hypnotist’s tone and the look on his face made the level of sincerity in his “diplomatic” statement clear.
The avian harrumphed and put his hands on his hips, opting to let the snide remarks go in favor of returning to the matter at hand. “Regardless, as long as Mumm-Ra has the Sword of Plundarr, it’d be a pipe dream. He’s not interested in seeing peace unless it’s everyone being subservient to him while he rules.”
Silvian fingered the hilt of the MoonSaber and met Selene’s eyes. “You’re naïve, sister, if you think that there could ever be peace between us and Plundarr or Thundera. It’s hard enough to keep our own Moons’ races united, and we’re all Lunatacs.”
The elder of the royal siblings frowned. “Difficult as it would be, it’s still better than the alternative—dying together.”
“Or we could just not worry about it until it becomes an actual problem,” Psiarik suggested, pulling Selene closer to him. “We have the sword, we’ll protect it, and the Moons will be safe. Why go looking for trouble?”
Lushara cast the psi a bemused look. “Is denial how you like to handle everything?”
“Let’s not start that again, please,” Frostor said with a note of finality. “Actually, I agree with him as far as the MoonSaber is concerned. With Silvian it’s in the hands of its rightful protector.” He looked at Selene. “Not that I think you have any less of a claim to it, but frankly, he’s more suited to combat. Queen you may be, warrior queen you are not.”
“I understand, Frostor, and I agree. Silvian always liked to play rougher than I did.”
“And I’d rather leave you with the paperwork and diplomacy,” the prince retorted.
Selene smiled good-naturedly. “That’s because it’s done right when I do it,” she said, and then addressed the group as a whole. “It’s agreed then. Silvian will be the MoonSaber’s master and guardian.”
* * *
In his quarters on New Thundera’s Cat’s Lair, Panthro lay back against his pillows, propping him up into a sitting position. His injuries from the crash had been deemed minor enough to keep him out of the medical bay, but Pumyra had recommended that he take it easy for a few more days, reminding him nicely that even strong panthers need time to recuperate. “We just want to be on the safe side,” she had said, but much like Lion-O, Panthro hated the safe side. It was boring.
Making his forced rest and relaxation more tedious were the vivid memories of Snoelle. The panther simply could not get his pretty savior on the ice moon out of his mind. The desire to see her again, not just to validate his experience but also to know her better, was driving him absolutely crazy. Panthro was not prone to acting like a cub with a crush, but when it came to Snoelle, he was absolutely smitten. He needed to find out who she was, why she as a Thundercat was alone on the ice moon, and get some straight answers.
He heard a knock at the door and called for whoever was there to come in. Six-year-old Pumari, Bengali and Pumyra’s daughter and only cub, entered the room smiling brightly and holding a plate of cookies balanced on top of a thick gold-bound book. “Hi Panthro. Are you feeling better?”
“I sure am, but I wish they’d let me prove it by letting me out of house arrest,” he replied.
The girl approached the bed and set the load she carried down. “Mom said that you should take it easy in case something didn’t heal right.”
“Your mom worries too much.”
“Yeah, sometimes,” Pumari agreed. “She sure got mad when I slid the spaceboard down the Lair’s front steps. She said I’d crack my head open, but I didn’t get hurt.”
Panthro laughed despite himself. “Well you should at least wear a helmet trying stunts like that.” He eyed the tray of cookies. “Snarf’s been baking today?”
Pumari nodded and held out the plate to him. “I helped him. They’re chocolate and berbil-berry. We still have a lot of them from our last trip to Third Earth.”
“Well if you helped then I’m sure they’re extra good,” Panthro said, and took a bite of one. He gave the girl the thumbs-up and then picked up the book she brought.
“Snarf said you wanted to read the Book of Omens so I brought it to you.” She watched as the panther began flipping through the pages. “What are you looking up? Anything neat like the Treasure of Thundera?”
He shook his head. “Not this time. I’m checking records of past Thundercats. I want to see if the Book of Omens says anything about the one who saved me on the ice moon.”
“Oh! Mom said you were talking about a lady who helped you there. I didn’t know she was a Thundercat too. What was her name?”
“Snoelle.”
“That’s a pretty name,” Pumari said, and then sighed. “Well, I can’t stay. Daddy said I had to help Snarf with the chores today and I’m not really done yet.” She headed for the door and waved. “I hope you find your friend.”
Panthro smiled and waved back. “Thanks. Me too.”
When she left, he returned his attention to the pages of the Book of Omens. He found the section devoted to chronicling the highlights of the careers of past Thundercat nobles. Thumbing through until he found the accounts dating to Lord Katan’s reign, he soon found an entry for a Thundercat with the same name that the woman on the ice moon had given him, along with a sketch of her likeness. He traced his fingertip over the edges of it, struck again when he saw that same face that had been haunting his thoughts. “You were there. I knew it.” Panthro then began to read the biographical information below the image:
Thundercat Snoelle, of the Snow Leopard Mountain Clan: Accomplished huntress and mystic of the
snows. Thundercat Snoelle earned the
love of her clan and the Thunderian people for her valiant combat in the Mutant
wars and for her selfless dedication to saving and helping those doomed in
deadly blizzards and avalanches.
Thundercat Snoelle’s last mission serving Lord Katan was to secure the
MoonSaber from notorious warlord King Mallar of the Third Moon of Plundarr to
prevent the Lunatac king from using its powers to oppress the people of
Thundera. Plundarr Mutants had already
declared their intent to conquer Thundera using their Sword of Plundarr,
willing to invoke the ancient Incantation of Destruction to assert their might
if necessary, and Lord Katan feared similar intentions from King Mallar given
his ruthless and imperialistic reputation, and the increasing number of Lunatac
raids in the western provinces of Thundera.
Thundercat Snoelle
successfully acquired the MoonSaber from the halls of the Lunatac King, but was
pursued by the Lunatac sorceress Chillandra, Mistress of the Cold, who shot
down her ship and forced her to crash on the Ice Moon of Plundarr. No further communications were received from
Thundercat Snoelle, but it is presumed that Chillandra overpowered Thundercat
Snoelle on Plundarr’s ice moon. Neither
the MoonSaber nor Thundercat Snoelle’s remains were recovered in the wreckage
of her craft. It is believed that the
Mistress of the Cold took the MoonSaber and Thundercat Snoelle, and hid or
destroyed them, as none of the three were ever heard from again.
The Snow Leopard
Mountain Clan was deeply grieved by the loss of Thundercat Snoelle and blamed
Lord Katan and inept leadership for her death.
The clan refused to allow any more of their number to join the
Thundercats as long as it was led by lions from Lord Katan’s line.
It was only when he finished reading the passage that Panthro realized that he had been holding his breath, and he inhaled sharply. Snoelle was only presumed dead on the ice moon, and that was why she was there to help me. A moment later he realized the folly in that line of thinking. Snoelle would have been quite old herself if that was the case, not the vibrant woman in her prime that he had encountered in the igloo. It occurred to Panthro then that he never actually felt her touch, only the warmth that radiated from it. Great Jaga, she’s a ghost, he realized with a great sense of disappointment. I was saved by a ghost. Dismayed, Panthro closed the Book of Omens. I’ll never see her again, he thought sadly.
* * *
That night, Panthro had a very vivid dream.
He was back in the
igloo on the ice moon, wrapped in a blanket by the warm glow of the fire. Snoelle came in and sat beside him. “I have come back for you,” she said in a
seductive whisper.
“Why did you leave
when the others came?” Panthro asked, but Snoelle did not answer. Instead she drew him into her arms and kissed
him with tender passion. The panther
eagerly accepted her delightful embrace and held her with desire and affection
after the kiss ended.
“Why did you leave?”
he asked again. “Where can I find you?”
“In my state I do not
belong in your realm,” came her cryptic response. “Just be with me now, handsome panther.” The snow leopard kissed him again, and that
time Panthro did not resist her charms further.
He took the beautiful Thunderian that had captivated him so into his
arms and made love to her, his senses alive with excitement and the delightful
touch of her soft fur that was most definitely not phantom flesh.
When pleasures of
their interlude came to an end, Panthro was dismayed to see his lover slipping
back into the shadows once more. “No,”
he called after her. “Don’t leave again!”
“I can not stay,” she
called back, her voice filled with regret.
“My cold prison binds me to this place.
Find me and save me, as I saved you, and I will come with you.”
Snoelle then vanished,
and as her form faded into the shadows, the warm glow of the fire died, leaving
Panthro shivering in the cold and lonely chamber.
Back in reality, Panthro sat bolt upright in his bed. He realized that what he had just experienced had been a dream, but the way his heart still pounded and the vivid memories of it left him knowing in his soul that it had also been something else. It was a sign, a call, a plea, from his savior to him to now save her. “Snoelle does exist and she’s still alive.” His mind reeled to sort through it. Panthro had never experienced otherworldly things the way Thunderians with a sixth sense, such as Cheetara, had, but he also knew that not everyone had to have that sense to be able to hear or experience such messages when they were sent by one who was. And the Book of Omens did say something about her being a “mystic of the snows”, Panthro recalled, and from what he remembered of the snow leopard clan, they had been a spiritual people with a belief that they were attuned to the astral world. If so, then it was conceivable that Snoelle, if she was alive and trapped, could have reached out to him with a psychic message.
“That’s good enough proof for me,” the panther decided, and leapt out of bed to ready himself for a trip back the ice moon.
Cheetara was out in the hall, awake and returning from a midnight visit to the little cheetah’s room when she passed Panthro on his way to the landing bay. Surprised to see him up not only up and about but also with a cat suit on, she followed him to the hangar. He was already at the Feliner II, a newer version of their original ship that had been built several years earlier so that they would have more than one at their disposal, when she reached him.
“And where are you off to at this hour?” she asked, brow raised as she knew that Pumyra had asked him to take it easy.
“I have to go back to the ice moon, Cheetara,” he said urgently.
“What?” the surprised cheetah exclaimed. “Why? Pumyra wants you resting, not out flying.” She frowned. “I hope this isn’t about your ship. We can recover some of it later for you to rebuilt, but now isn’t—”
“It’s not the blasted ship, Cheetara, it’s Snoelle,” Panthro said impatiently as he lifted the hatch, before turning back toward Cheetara. “I know that you all think I imagined her, but she’s there. I know it. And she needs my help. She’s trapped, and I’ve got to figure out how to free her so she can come home.”
The passion and conviction with which he spoke gave Cheetara pause. Panthro was not the type to indulge a crazy whim, but he was someone that would go to the ends of creation for the right reasons. “How do you know this, Panthro?” she asked. “I know you experienced something there, but WilyKit said the scanners didn’t pick up on anyone or anything other than you.”
“Then the scanners were wrong,” Panthro asserted. “Look, I know what I’m saying probably sounds a little off, but I know what I feel and I have to go. I had this dream about her where she told me she was trapped, that she couldn’t leave there without being freed. And dang blast it, if there’s any way to do it, I will.”
“A dream,” Cheetara repeated. More so than any of the other Thundercats, Cheetara could understand what it was like to be driven by a hunch. Living with a sixth sense made that often unexplainable sense of certainty about something that could not be accounted for otherwise a reality. “All right, Panthro. I understand. But I don’t think you should go by yourself. Whether you agree or not, Pumyra thinks as a healer and your friend that you need more time to recover, and the ice moon isn’t easy terrain in our best form.”
“All right. Another set of eyes can’t hurt. Come on aboard.” He waved for her to join him.
“Whoa, let me get a cat suit first!” the cheetah protested with a laugh. “And while I’m at it, I’ll see if I can rouse a few others to come along too. Landing on Lunatac territory we ought to be prepared for trouble, especially if your rescuer friend is being held prisoner.”
Panthro nodded, impatient but still appreciative of the help. “Okay, but hurry. I’d like to get moving.”
Cheetara smiled back at him. “No problem. You don’t have to tell a cheetah to hurry.” She then darted out, and in the time it took Panthro to top off the Feliner II’s fuel and warm the engines up, Cheetara returned with Lion-O, Tygra, and WilyKit, each with cat suits and weapons in their hands.
“Cheetara says you’re sure that this Thundercat Snoelle is up there imprisoned on the moon,” Lion-O said as they climbed aboard.
“More than ever,” the panther assured his lord. “I’ll wash Snarf’s dishes for a week if she’s not.”
WilyKit chortled as she fastened her seat belt. “Wow, well Snarf will love you if you’re wrong.”
Panthro found himself thinking that he would much rather Snoelle love him if he was right, especially in light of that dream, but he kept the thought to himself. Instead he simply laughed along with his friends in good spirits as they blasted off into the sky above.
* * *
The other Plundarrian moons and nearby planets shone brightly in the ice moon’s nighttime sky, causing the snow-covered tundra of the ice moon of Plundarr to cast a slight glow that led additional light to the darkness of the uninhabited area. Wearing their cat suits, the Thundercats disembarked from the Feliner II and began to explore the area surrounding the igloo in which they had found Panthro after his crash.
“No footprints except for ours, not even an animal,” Tygra remarked.
Lion-O looked around the desolate area, fighting a sense of disappointment. Although he and the others still had some doubts, he had hoped they were wrong, not only for Panthro’s sake, but for the sake of the Thundercat they had come to rescue if she needed their help. “I hate to say it, but I think Snarf’s dishes may be calling your name, Panthro.”
“I know she’s here,” Panthro insisted. He stepped inside the igloo, but was dismayed to find only the burnt out fire as evidence that anyone at all had been there. Given the crystalline ice coating on the ashes, it was clear that it had not been lit again since the Thundercats had last been there. “She has to be here. I know it.”
Walking slowly toward the center of the room, Cheetara closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind to be receptive to any psychic signals that her sixth sense might pick up on. She did not hear or see anything, but she did feel an overwhelming urge to face the northwest wall, and walk toward it. “Strange…”
“What is it?” WilyKit asked.
“I tried to feel with my sixth sense if anyone was here, and while I didn’t hear anything, I felt drawn to this spot.” Panthro came to her side, while Tygra and WilyKit stopped what they were doing and moved closer as Lion-O drew the Sword of Omens.
“If the woman Panthro dreamt about is a Thundercat, then perhaps the Eye of Thundera can show us where she is.” He held the mystical blade of the Thunderians upright, even with his eyes. “Sword of Omens, give me sight beyond sight!”
Through the hilt he saw Cheetara and Panthro, and the floor beyond them facing the northwest wall alit with a surreal blue glow. The sword’s focus moved in closer on that spot, seemingly penetrating the ice-packed floor of the chamber. Beneath it revealed what appeared to be a sleeping figure of a Thunderian woman ensconced in the blue light that had taken on the impression of solid crystalline matter. Her features were hazy, but he could see a Thundercat insignia on the clasp of the cloak that covered her body. Lion-O’s eyes lit up with astonishment and urgency that matched Panthro’s. “By Jaga, you were right, Panthro!” he exclaimed. “There is a Thundercat buried here, right where Cheetara was drawn to!”
Immediately fishing an explosive pellet out of her pouch, WilyKit motioned for the others to stand back. “Then let’s dig,” she said, and tossed it. The marble exploded on impact, breaking through the crust of ice on the floor.
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Panthro said, and began using the lasers in his nunchuks to speed things along.
It did not take long for the collective efforts of the Thundercats to reach the blue material Lion-O had seen with the sword’s sight beyond sight, and soon they were able to remove enough of the natural ice and snow pack around it that they could see the figure trapped inside as well. “She’s totally encased in it,” an astonished Tygra said. “This is more like a coffin than anything, though. How can she be alive?”
As if to prove to them that she was, the woman’s eyes opened from within the ice, startling them all, and WilyKit enough so that she gasped aloud.
“We have to get her out,” Panthro said, lifting his nunchuks to take aim again.
“Hold on a moment, Panthro.” Cheetara ran her glove across the blue crystal. “This isn’t ordinary ice. It’s got magical properties. Feel it, it’s colder than the ice here. It’s almost freezing my fingertips through the gloves.”
Tygra knelt and touched his fingers to it also to confirm what Cheetara had said. “Incredible. And yet she’s been able to survive inside it.”
“She’s a snow leopard,” Panthro told them. “I read about her in the Book of Omens.”
WilyKit eyed them, and the Thundercat they were rescuing, somberly. “All the snow leopards are gone.”
“Even so, not even a cold-resistant snow leopard could live encased in ice that didn’t have magical properties,” said Tygra.
Cheetara nodded. “It must’ve kept her in some kind of stasis.”
“Then let’s break the ice and find out,” Lion-O said decisively. “The Sword of Omens won’t harm another Thundercat, so we’ll use it to crack the blue ice.” He raised the sword and let out a hearty cry of “Ho!” A beam of energy sprang from the blade, penetrating and splintering the magical ice so that it fell away from the Thundercat trapped inside it.
Panthro knelt and scooped up the newly freed woman, and he recognized her immediately as the woman from his dreams, and the one who had saved him from his crash. “Snoelle,” he said warmly, smiling down at her.
The black and white spotted Thunderian stirred and moaned as she looked up at the panther that held her. “What—where am I?”
“With friends,” Cheetara told her, also smiling at her.
Standing above the panther and cheetah kneeling by the snow leopard, Lion-O nodded and gave her a warm look. “We freed you from your prison. Panthro led us here. He said you rescued him, and then came to him in a dream.” He sheathed the Sword of Omens in the claw shield. “I see from your insignia that you’re a Thundercat. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Lion-O, Lord of the Thundercats of New Thundera, and these are the good Thundercats and friends that serve me and the Code of Thundera.”
She nodded and sat up, looking from Panthro and Cheetara and then to Lion-O and the others that stood with him. “I’m Thundercat Snoelle of the Snow Leopard Mountain Clan,” she introduced herself. “I serve Lord Katan.” She eyed Lion-O curiously. “Or I once did. I… Lord Katan isn’t with us any longer, is he?”
Tygra shook his head. “I’m sorry. Lord Katan was Lord Lion-O’s grandfather. Many years have passed since then.” He smiled at her. “I’m Tygra, by the way. A pleasure to meet you.”
“And I’m WilyKit,” WilyKit said from beside Tygra. “It’s an honor to have you with us, Snoelle. If your clan was still with us, I’m sure they’d be glad to have you back too.”
“If they were… what do you mean?”
Panthro patted the agitated snow leopard’s back reassuringly. “Shh, take it easy for now. You’ve been through a lot.”
“If that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black,” Tygra chuckled knowingly, while Snoelle met Panthro’s eyes.
“Panthro,” she said, her face lighting up with recognition. “You came for me. I knew you would.” The weary snow leopard rested her head against his strong shoulder.
The panther smiled down at her. “Of course I did. How could I not, especially after you saved me?”
“How did you do that, anyway, if you were trapped in the ice?” WilyKit asked.
Sitting up, Snoelle began her explanation. “Astral projection. I had mystic training from my clan members, and I know how to reach through the ethers to the astral. When Chillandra—the Lunatac that bested me—encased me in that, she gloated that she would freeze me in time so that I would live with my failure forever, unable to do anything about my fate but lament it. She said I didn’t deserve anything as quick and final as death.” She looked away. “I couldn’t live and couldn’t die inside her ice tomb, but I did have consciousness, so I was still able to project. My astral body can affect the material plane in close proximity to my natural body, but its effectiveness diminishes over distance. I built this igloo over time to create a shelter for myself in case I was ever actually able to break free so that I might survive out here in his desolate ice land. That’s also how I pulled Panthro from the wreckage of his ship. He didn’t crash far from here.”
“No,” Lion-O confirmed. “It’s just a short walk as long as it’s not blizzard conditions out there.”
“Which it quite often is,” Snoelle said.
“If you could reach the astral, why didn’t you use it to send a message to one of the Thundercats to get help before now?” Cheetara asked her.
Snoelle gave the cheetah a rueful look. “I couldn’t. The astral is as vast as the mortal plane, and many unfriendly spirits traverse this part of it. As I said, the farther my spirit goes from my body, the weaker it becomes, and not being fully dead, on the astral plane I’m weaker than those fully crossed over. Until Panthro turned up, I never encountered a soul that I could trust to help me there.”
“And in the mortal world, you couldn’t because Thundera was too far,” Tygra guessed, to which Snoelle nodded an affirmative.
“I was very lucky to have friends stumble upon me and rescue me. Thank you all,” Snoelle said, and smiled at Panthro. “And thank you especially, Panthro, for returning the favor.” She took his hand and gave it a squeeze.
Panthro grinned, and felt a warm flush rise to his cheeks that he was thankful were covered with gray fur that kept it hidden. “You’re very welcome. Anytime.”
She eyed him intently. “Do you remember your dream? Your astral body came all the way here.”
Thinking of the erotic dream, he could not help but smile a little wider. “Real well. I remember it real well.”
Snoelle echoed his smile with a sentiment left unsaid, and then closed her eyes again. “I’m still so tired.”
“Then we’ll take you home to Cat’s Lair,” Cheetara offered, and rose to her feet while Panthro scooped the exhausted snow leopard into his arms.
Tygra nodded. “Pumyra will take excellent care of you. Just ask Panthro.”
“Hah,” was the panther’s only response as they started for the door.
“We’re glad to have you with us,” Lion-O told Snoelle earnestly. “As a fellow noble, you’re welcome to stay with us as long as you wish.”
“Thank you, my lord.”
The Feliner II then carried all of the Thundercats from the ice moon home to New Thundera once and for all.
* * *
A Plundarrian moon away, Psiarik tossed and turned in his sleep. A recurring nightmare that had plagued him on and off since his youth returned that night in force. It had been some time since he had last had the dream, but once upon a time it had haunted him nearly every night.
He was a teenager
again, standing under the angry and accusing gazes of his mother and stepfather
in the study of his family house. His
young half-sister Psilina sat nearby crying.
She had not meant to get him into so much trouble, and his stepfather
had such a temper sometimes…
“Don’t you feel any
remorse for what you’ve done?” his stepfather yelled.
“I didn’t know she’d
get scared,” he protested. “I just
wanted her to forget she saw me.”
“Your stunt with mind
control gave her nightmares! All so you
could get away with sneaking out, and to do what? Get into trouble, it’s all you ever do.” He glowered down at him in contempt.
“I never wanted to
scare her, I told you that!” Psiarik hollered back. “I didn’t know it’d do that to her!”
His stepfather slammed his fist against the wall, rattling the ornate gold-framed mirror on it. “What did you think manipulating her fears to make her do what you said would do?”
Psiarik stared at the
floor. “I didn’t think it would be a big
deal. I just wanted—”
“You just wanted, you
just wanted,” his stepfather repeated, glaring at him coldly. “Everything’s
about you, isn’t it? So damn
self-centered,” he growled. “How many
times do your mother and I have to tell you to get it to sink in that no son of
ours will be a hypnotist? It’s the
profession of charlatans and con artists and scum.”
“I’m not your son, like you like to point out all the time.”
“No, but you’ll damn
well be respectable as long as you bear our family’s name. I won’t let you turn into a disgrace to your
mother. Learn to control yourself, you
spoiled little punk.”
“What do you know?”
Psiarik shouted back at his stepfather, burning at the sting in his words. It was true that he had deliberately
manipulated Psilina to cover himself, but it was also true that he never
intended her any harm. “You’re a
seer. Tell him, Mother. Tell him what it’s like to just know and feel
what others are thinking.”
His mother Lurella
turned toward him with a disapproving look in her eyes. “Knowing something about someone and using it
are two different things, and you know that. If you had a shred of respect for yourself
and our good name, you’d channel your abilities into something worthwhile
instead of acting like someone like your father.”
His stepfather nodded
along with his mother. “You ought to be
ashamed. You’re more your father’s son
every day. Keep it up, and someday
you’ll wind up just like him. Is that
what you want to be?”
“I’m not like him!” the younger psi protested vehemently. “I’m not!
I said I was sorry and I didn’t want to hurt her. What more do you want?”
“You to clean up your
act, for one.” Lurella turned around
staunchly. “Leave and think about what
you’ve done.”
“Fine!” Doing as his mother and stepfather asked,
Psiarik stormed out of the study, out of the house, out into the hills of his family’s
Third Moon property. Why were they
always so unreasonable? Why did they act
like they never did anything wrong, never made any mistakes? What gave them the right to think they were
so perfect, that they were so much better than him?
Sulking and fuming as
he traversed the hilly ground, he found a grassy knoll and sat on it, glaring
in the direction of his familial manor.
He heard a distant rumble, an ominous groan that seemed to be coming
from all around, and he looked around, startled. The purple sky of Dasanalith was varying
shades of red and orange, splotched with black and gray. It never looked that way, even at sunset, and
suddenly he had the sense that something was terribly, terribly wrong.
Before he could ponder
what it was, an ear-shattering explosion echoed throughout the hills, and when
he turned to see what had caused it, his blood ran cold. The mountain on the far side of the valley in
the distance had exploded into a ball of flame.
Ash and fumes filled the air, and he fell to the ground choking and
gagging. The ground around him began to
shake again, more violently than he had ever experienced, and he clutched at
the grass in vain as his eyes began to water.
There was another
crack, that time in the direction of his home.
He turned and to his horror, the ground split open and he saw the
structure begin to quake and fall apart.
“No!” he shouted fruitlessly as one wall collapsed, then another, and
the whole manor fell in on itself and disappeared into the chasm, vanishing forever.
He cried out again,
but it was too late. The ground beneath
him went still, and the acrid smell of smoke and sulfur remained on the air
while rumbles and sirens sounded from far away.
The realization that his family was gone and that he would never see any
of them again began to sink in, and his earlier anger at them seemed suddenly
trivial and meaningless.
Then, his familiar dream changed from the terrible memory that replayed the day the disasters had taken his family from him to a new and more sinister nightmare.
Psiarik was an adult
again, and now he stood in an unfamiliar place that he somehow knew to be New
Thundera. A red-haired lion Thundercat
was there viciously wielding the Sword of Omens. Selene faced off with him with the MoonSaber,
her gentle face stained with tears and the blood of her brother, who lay
motionless on the ground nearby. A rat
Mutant was with them, seemingly ready to slaughter them both with his own
sword, the deadly double-bladed Sword of Plundarr. In the distance Psiarik could see two cloaked
figures emanating an evil as strong as could be, watching the scene unfold with
cruel amusement. He knew the danger his
wife was in, and called out to Selene.
But he called too
late, and the three swords met and clashed.
Lightning crashed all around as the cloaked figures began chanting in a
foreign and ancient tongue. Each of the
mystical swords joined into a weapon of unfathomable strength and an
unstoppable destructive force pulled the very life force from Selene, the
Thundercat, and the Mutant until all three fell to the ground dead. Psiarik rushed toward Selene, but the ground
began to tremble, and the earthquake knocked him down so that he could not
move. He watched helplessly as a chasm
opened beneath the fallen heroes of each world and the ground swallowed them
up, leaving him alone to bear witness to the darkness and devastation.
“Not again!” he
screamed. It was then that he saw he was
not alone. The chanting figures grew
larger, taking hold of the weapon, while the watchful face of his father
appeared above him. Alluro said only one
word. “Destiny.”
Psiarik turned away,
unable to bear it any longer. “You can’t
stop what is destined to be,” a disembodied voice called out as he closed his
eyes and willed it all away. “When the
past becomes the present and the ancient struggle is set in motion, only what
seems impossible can stop the inevitable.”
Drenched in a cold sweat, Psiarik sprang back into consciousness. Panicked, he looked to his side and saw, much to his relief, Selene sleeping peacefully in bed with him. He noticed then that he was still trembling and took a deep breath to calm himself. “Just a stupid dream,” he muttered, and lay back down against the pillows. He closed his eyes and attempted to sleep again, but that proved impossible. The dream had been too vivid and unnerving to allow him any rest.
A few minutes later he gave up entirely and got up. Slipping into a robe he made his way through the darkened corridors of the MoonTower to a room where he could pour himself a glass of Plundarrian whiskey to soothe his nerves.
He was unaware that both his dream and his actions in the waking world were being watched from beyond. A world away, in a black pyramid, Mumm-Ra the Ever-Living smiled with unashamed delight.