Striking Into Darkness Part II
First team, followed by Osmet, flowed across the street and into the temple. A spell made rapid, soundless work of the door locks. Saemael waited until Osmet emerged from the interior blackness to signal his group into the building. Saemael smelled the metallic tang of blood in the air. Osmet had made the first kill of the night; probably the four security officers that intelligence predicted.
Inside, the blood of dead Ophidians made a black sheen upon the glaringly white stone of the temple floor. The vertical spray patterns indicated that it was high pressure arterial bleeding that was responsible for the deaths of the guards. Arterial bleeding, no doubt, released by Osmet's expert blade work. The sight of the decapitated bodies merely confirmed Saemael's suspicions. The elves began to slide into four member teams. Into the rooms, they broke off straightaway with neither a word nor a hand motion. Nothing needed to be said. Everyone knew the drill.
Seconds passed. Only a few muffled thunks of arrows penetrating flesh or the wet hissing of blades opening bodies were the only noises to escape the assault. There was no need to activate their spheres of silence, all of the magic they possessed operating simultaneously would certainly overload the concealing magic and the abominations would be very displeased to discover them. Luckily, no Ophidians were blessed this night by their infernal god. Saemael smiled ruefully as he stepped over the fallen creatures, cursing their souls in his heart to burn forever in pain and anguish. He hated them. It was right to hate them. They were inferior, scaly and strange.
When the first floor was cleared, the elven infiltrators climbed the stairs to the next floor with swordsmen in front, archers behind and mages in the rear. Somewhat surprisingly, the second floor proved as easy to secure as the first. Saemael frowned. Something didn't seem quite right here. It was never this easy....Never. Certainly not in the center of one of their cities. Something was wrong, he could feel it.
Just as the group was making their way to the third floor, the world exploded into violence. Saemael was in the front rank as they sped up the stairs, they had to clear the confines of the stairwell, attack through the ambush. He felt the cold embrace of dread in his gut a split second before a volley of corrosive acid bolts impacted to his left. An elven soldier, Ivben, screamed as the acid burned through armor, flesh and bone. His swords drawn, Saemael rushed forward and slashed at the darkness that concealed his enemies, they had spheres of darkness and of course the detection magics he possessed were either disabled or unable to detect that quality of magic. Saemael's darkvision was useless, but his training allowed him to fight with only a slight reduction in effectiveness. Screams and explosions raged around Saemael until spheres of silence expanded to envelope him.
Robbed of sight and sound, he felt useless and vulnerable. He sidled further into the room, hoping to emerge from the demonically cast darkness and silence. He felt the stifling silent inkyness dispelled around him and the battle raged. The Ophidians had the elvish infiltrators in a crossfire of arrows and spells. The elves were pressed against walls or contorted behind any available cover where they attempted to return fire. Several lay dead on the floor and others' lifeblood spilled down the white marble steps.
Eldritch magics rumbled behind Saemael. They thundered past him as spheres of fire flew down the wide hallway until they exploded in midair. The Ophidians had erected a one way antimagic barrier, exceptionally powerful, since all four fireballs had been stopped without overloading it. Lightning fast, Saemael's swords were scabbarded and his composite shortbow was at the ready. An Ophidian fell with an arrow through the eye. Then, another fell after the first, an arrow piercing his scaly neck. All of the remaining elves were firing arrows accurately into the Ophidians. Saemael knew that the four snipers posted on the roofs of the adjacent building were doing all they could, although it was woefully ineffective in relieving the pressure on those inside the Temple. Their fields of fire were simply too limited. Electricity arced down the hallway and impacted Khievan Ghen with horrifying force. His head exploded in a shower of steaming blood and brains. His headless body set to burning as the lightning shot out of Ghen's spastic limbs towards the surviving elves. Chained Lightning...
Spheres of concussive force slammed into Saemael's left greave, breaking his forearm and shattering his shortbow into splinters. The skirmish line was faltering for the elves were caught basically in the open on the third floor landing. There was nowhere to go except forward or back and one way was death while the other was dishonor and death, since this was obviously an ambush, the Ophidians would have a team sealing off the second floor. There was nowhere to hide; nowhere to run. Saemael's right arm flew down of its own accord. He drew his sword, ground his teeth, and sprinted towards the enemy.
A shift of reality to Saemael's right and his target appeared to assemble from the air. Shokoru Zhehn had just teleported into the midst of the assassins sent to kill him. A demonseed elite, Shokoru was a demigod and a nigh immortal opponent, ancient and vile. Without thinking, Saemael shifted his weight and leapt at his target. The magical energies flaring from his sword swept in a wide arc towards the half Humanoid, half snake abomination that dared to defy the very laws of nature by existing.
Shokoru Zhehn's four muscled arms were wielding weapons of exotic ferociousness. His dully gleaming scales were covered in tight weave quicksilver chain mail to his waist. The demon's arms, with paranormal agility, easily parried Saemael's charging attack. The strength and sheer weight of the enormous Ophidian's body lent itself well as he effortlessly slashed through the Lanthan's black armor as if it were not metal at all, but only paper. The silver blade of the Ophidian slid coldly, deeply, into his elven assailant. With a sickening splatter of blood upon stone and scale, Saemael was limply impaled upon the Shokoru's blade.
Casually flinging Saemael off his sword, the grey black serpent slithered toward the surviving elves. Paralyzed from the waist down, Saemael moaned and painful tears formed in his failing eyes. With sheer determination born of desperation and a knowledge of impending death, he clawed his way across the floor, hoping to kill the abomination before his lifeblood escaped him. The four armed demonic man serpent was well protected from magical or mundane damage. This was obvious or he would have been felled by spell or steel immediately. Strike Team 144 were experts at killing, and it was a challenge to all of elfdom that Shokoru Zhehn had lain down by teleporting in to personally destroy his attackers.
Two arrows flew towards Shokoru, immolating themselves as purple flares that splashed sparkling ashes over him and caused waves of magical protection to slough off in a dissipating cascade storm. The arrows were fired by the snipers deployed on the roof outside the Temple. Shokoru roared sibilantly and spat acid upon Surah who fell to the floor, groveling and clutching horribly at what was left of his face. The abomination's long, constricting tail choked Aliana's life from her. Her beautiful face turned blue in his hideous coils. Saemael swallowed and tried not to think of the pain in his own body.
Shokuru's four arms were engaged in a whirling dance of steel with Osmet, who dodged and wove about the serpent with practiced skill. As the two great warriors slashed and parried with one another, the seconds past. Surah's screams finally ended in one agonizing moan as his life finally dissolved into a viscous puddle of various shades of bloody crimson and brackish green. Aliana struggled. She punched and pulled upon the massive tail that held her fast. She writhed helplessly one last time as her neck was crushed. Blood poured out her ears, mouth and nose.
Several Ophidians rushed to the window through which the sniper's arrows had entered. They began to lay down a withering barrage of arrows with shortbows. Two clerics began to chant behind the snipers and added their hellish firepower to that of the archers. Walls exploded, air turned to poison and fires erupted from their fingertips and flew towards the elvish sniper teams. There would likely be no more help from the snipers.
Fighting against the need to die, Saemael continued to crawl towards his enemy. Osmet and Nuatha were the only elves still standing. Osmet engaged the demonseed with a pair of silver blades that danced like flame while Nuatha was rapidly firing spells towards Shokoru. For his part, Shokoru was withstanding the steel onslaught of Osmet with his bottom pair of arms. With the other set, he dispelled, deflected, retargeted and cast spells at a remarkable rate. Nuatha could barely cast a spell and dodge in the time that it took Shokoru to cast a spell, react to her spell and cast another one. This was a battle that needed to be decided quickly. The mission must be fulfilled, regardless of cost.
Nuatha spun her hands in a circle of power, frost blue tracers around her fingers signaling the beginning of a great spell. Suddenly, before she could finish the arcane chant, her head was snapped back and a razor sharp blade yanked cruelly across her neck. A magically cloaked Ophidian had crept behind her and killed her with one draw of his weapon. Crimson exploded from the grinning wound, geysering out ten feet in a fan shaped pattern. The spell, complete, but undirected, discharged, flash freezing her body, her assassin and the red fan of gore as the temperature dropped by a hundred degrees in an instant.
Osmet, realizing his entire group had been destroyed in mere seconds, had no choice but to press his attack and hope for glory.
Shokoru's tail wrapped around Osmet's legs. One hand grabbed the elven warrior's belt and another slammed hard into Osmet's face with devastating force. The blow echoed throughout the room with a shattering, ripping, splattering sound that heralded the complete destruction of both Osmet's magical helm as well as his face. The Elf's weapons flew from his suddenly flaccid hands; his life ebbing away in the air like acrid smoke.
A voice like none that Saemael had ever heard came from out of the great serpent; a voice that seared the soul with its sibilant melody and harsh deepness. "A'Sha Lahra Ss'Vash Val'Harish!" Shokoru screamed out to his father, his god Ss'Vash, and viciously ran the elven commander through with two wicked and deadly straight swords. Resembling oddly a child's psychotic marionette, Osmet's body began to spasm in its final death throes upon the upraised swords. The blood ran down the silver blades onto the torso and arms of the snake. Shokoru's hideous face turned for a moment in Saemael's direction. He smiled, a visage that Saemael knew well for it was the look of victory on the face of a superior adversary.
Somewhere between the pain of his body and the shock in his soul, Saemael must've started to scream. Everyone was gone, destroyed, devastated. No one was spared except him. His lover, his commander, his friends...people he had known for most of his 300 years and had fought beside through many campaigns... all dead by these degenerate demonic trash.
His mind gave way in the darkness of that hated and abominable Temple. Saemael wailed and cried out repeatedly until the monsters grew tired of his misery. Finally, they allowed him a measure of peace. They simply shot him through the skull with an arrow as they might've any minor vermin that dared violate the sanctity of their devilish god's Temple.
Sar'Than Valanian knew the mission was a failure when there was no telepathic contact within two hours, the appointed time. When the team missed the next communications window, there was no doubt about the fate of the Strike Team. Sar’Than felt a quick moment of weakness as he allowed a second of sadness to fill his soul for his lost team. He knew that it was hopeless, but he would follow the normal procedures for such things. He would keep a cloaked teleportation area available in case someone had survived, but The Chosen of Ss'Vash never took prisoners.
Sar'Than informed Lucius Kreb'iun, and it was now his unfortunate task to inform Executor Silesia of the missions' failure. The telepathic signal chimed in Silesia's mind, and he allowed the mental circuit to form. Silesia was seated in his chamber with four of his proteges. He took the call in silence, not wishing to cloud their minds with operational details while they were in the midst of another project.
"Executor, I regret to inform you of the probable loss of ST 144. They have missed their communications window." Silesia nodded in acceptance of the news; he knew that there was no reason for Osmet to miss communications unless he was dead. If Osmet was dead and he was by far the most exceptional warrior on the team, then the entire team would be as well. Silesia concentrated and formed the telepathic reply in his mind, "The proper protocols will be observed. Continue to keep me informed until confirmation is gained." Lucius acknowledged and cut the link.
"Now then, let us continue," Silesia said aloud. The four Elven apprentices nodded in response to the request and began the situation reports again. Silesia listened for only the pertinent details.
His acolytes continued to give data and he continued to act interested. Nothing new was being reported that Silesia didn’t already know or suspect. The world was in chaos, about to go down in flames, and he simply couldn’t force himself to care.
When the four elves had finished speaking, Silesia dismissed them with a wave of his hand and they turned and exited the chamber of the Executor of Manipulation. When they had gone, a slight tinge of ozone filled the chamber and a sheet of blue electricity formed and shaped itself into a circular gate. Silesia did not bother to look, for he knew that it was Aressa Y'Thulsa, the self styled political manipulator.
"I must say, Vladimir, these gatherings of your’s are entirely too long...and boring" she said as she walked through the gate and it dissipated into nothing behind her.
"Aressa, I allow you access to my sanctum for only one reason, which has nothing to do with entertaining your perverse pleasures. Have you the information I requested?"
Aressa strode over and sat languidly upon one of the four plush-covered, marble benches facing the imposing obsidian desk Silesia sat behind. She smiled sardonically, "Of course, I am but a humble servant of the Empire".
With that, she conjured a sealed envelope and sent it slowly through the air towards him. Silesia snapped his fingers, and the envelope was opened slowly. Its contents, a single sheet of crisp parchment, was unfolded by silent, invisible hands. The unseen servant telepathically read the message to Silesia.
He smiled a predatory grin and focused on the Elven woman sitting on the bench. Her impudence annoyed him. She was foolish, believing she had some type of power here. Silesia could have banished her to any number of abominable places with a simple spell, barely more than a thought. Yet, Aressa leaned back on the bench with her shapely legs leisurely crossed, with a look of boredom on her face. Everything in her posture irritated him. If it were not for the fact that she had access to information he did not....
As it was, as long as she was useful, she would continue to exist. However, it would bring a smile to Silesia's lips when her soul was finally imprisoned in the Soul Diamond upon his desk. Traitors were anathema to Silesia, but he did occasionally have to make use of them in order to ensure the eventual victory of A'Lanthas. Sacrifices at all levels were required, although only the Veid Krusus seemed to understand this truth.
"Aressa, you may leave now, and consider your invitation to have been rescinded,” he looked down at the desk, instantly banishing her from his attentions. She stood to go, huffing slightly as she did so. Just as she spoke the words to open the gate, Silesia added softly, “If your services are required in the future, I had best be able to find you." He knew the implied threat would not be lost on her.
After her departure, Silesia allowed himself another moment of silent sorrow for the loss of Osmet and his unit. They had served the Empire faithfully, and Silesia was tired of having his soldiers be sent on fools' errands by The Pure. The most recent Martyrs of the Race would be missed, at least by their commander. Regretfully, their names would be added with Silesia’s own hands to the Wall of Sacrifice.
Fin
Hope you like it.
-STS
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