Chapter 67

“I can close the portals off from this end,” Athena volunteered. “What I will need is for the Orcs to assist me as I help clear Tinchik for them.”

“Are you sure?” Roxanne asked, concern written all over her face.

“The portal, yes. Tinchik ... not so sure, which is why I’ll need a hand. It will free up your forces to deal with the other cities one by one ... or at least clear the portal sites until I can get there.”

“That I believe we can do. How long will you need at Tinchik?” Arch replied after a moment’s thought.

“A day to be sure. As yet I’m nowhere near what Beog was when he forced them behind that shield,” Athena shrugged.

“We’ll give you the time,” Roxanne nodded as she sent out the signal to pull the battalions back from the ruins of Tinchik’s outer suburbs.

“So you want us to seize the portal site at Zrik and hold it for 24 hours ... possibly longer, whilst Athena does her thing?” I asked of Arch who had ported in to give us new orders.

“Yes, John. Athena can clear out the infestations quicker than we can ... so she claims and wants the Orcs to see her in all her glory when she does it.”

“Hell of a risk if it goes wrong.”

“Yep, but part of her message is that she’s not ‘all powerful’ so that will help a bit if it takes her a while.”

“Using Tenklar’s people?” Róisín asked.

“Yes, also Crnnch and his people, along with several hundred who have the new pistols to try out,” Arch nodded.

“Bold plan,” I chuckled.

“Yep, but now you need to ensure that they can get to each site without getting swarmed by Vultoqi,” he agreed.

“Good job they haven’t figured out the quantum variance for multiple portal destinations,” Kate murmured as we hauled ourselves to our feet and the orders went out via Birry.

“Don’t hold your breath on that one, it’s a natural progression of the math,” Arch noted as the Seers opened a hidden portal to Zrik for us.

“The forces of Ar-Thenna have pulled back, Seeker,” Tenklar reported as Crnnch, his staff, as well as several hundred grunts armed with the new pistols, came through a Yr’ch sanctioned portal.

“Then let us prepare to advance,” Crnnch ordered, just as a series of glowing forms appeared, one of whom was his goddess.

“My children,” Athena greeted the Yr’ch, all of whom had dropped to one knee, including the grunts Crnnch had brought with him; none of whom he had thought were followers of the goddess.

“Greetings, my goddess. Lead us!” Crnnch stated into the silence.

No other words were spoken, but suddenly the Vultoqi portal shut down with an audible snap, followed by the Yr’ch units suddenly being on the outskirts of Tinchik.

“Advance! Know that I am with you and will protect you,” Athena pointed, her form now encased in glowing Yr’ch-like armour.

Led by the three glowing figures, whom Crnnch recognised as Gregorius, Pugard and Frunt, the Yr’ch advanced into the ruins as the form of Athena grew and encompassed them all. Suddenly the Vultoqi stalking them were highlighted to his vision in a glowing red nimbus which was the signal for the attack to begin. Plasma bolts lanced out to hit their targets, causing many of the Vultoqi to tumble and others to fall back.

“We’re winning!” he thought to himself. “We’re finally winning!”

The fighting at Zrik was savage. The Vultoqi position was in a naturally fortified area and defended in depth as they realised our attack was going in. Nevertheless the Drow were advancing steadily on the site as they were covered by the Loegrians sniping at any Vultoqi who over-exposed themselves. This gave the Loegrian railguns a chance to lock onto the target. Also moving in with the Drow were a couple of Mazdani, Gorgons, wolves and Nosferatu who were acting as shock troops. The Gorgons were able to access the power of Athena as she was on the planet with them. Casualties were fortunately low on our side. The medic Mage Serena was able to assist the wounded Drow to be healed rather than them having to be returned to base for healing by Xi or Kyra, hence the increasing desperation of the Vultoqi to prevent us from getting within sight of the portal exit.

Our task was not being made any easier by the Vultoqi emerging from the portal, though fortunately not in any great numbers, yet enough to occasionally push us back from a hard fought for position. Still, our numbers and firepower were getting us ever closer to our goal.

For all the Vultoqi didn’t have ‘eyes’ they were still vulnerable to the Gorgons’ curse as the band of photosensitive cells circling their upper body served the same purpose and produced the same results. Realising this, the battalion were coalescing around the ladies and ensuring that nothing was getting near them.

“Word from Crnnch,” Róisín yelled. “Tinchik expected to be cleared within the hour. Will move onto Zrik next. He also added, save some for us!”

“How are the other battalions doing?” I asked with a grin.

“As well as we are. The Seers advised they got behind the Gorgons and punched through.”

“It works well, though I doubt it will work in their heartland. There’s something we don’t understand at all about those patripures.”

“I know, John. Even Athena is very nervous about them.”

“Yep. Time for the final push now, get ready,” I advised. “Birry! On me. Let’s take them!” I added, moving forward to a gap opening up in the Vultoqi lines.

“Follow our Mage!” Birry yelled as the battalion now advanced at a run, firing a series of Null bullets as we broke through to the portal site, catching several adelshaut as they emerged.

“What is the current situation on Vultoq?” Karkol asked Brnnt during the Archimandrite meeting.

“Tinchik is back in our hands. The Seeker and his forces have moved on to Zrik,” Brnnt replied, keeping a few details to himself as per his plan with Karkol to keep the Council destabilised and unable to coalesce around a new leader.

“How was this Seeker able to clear Tinchik?” an astonished Takas questioned.

“They were helped by the forces of Ar-Thenna ... at least initially. Those forces then went on to take the portal openings at Zrik, A’Nith and Gundrad, permitting our forces to move to these cities and begin the cleansing.”

“You aren’t telling us everything,” Ambost accused.

“What else would you like to know? That the goddess Ar-Thenna appeared and led our forces to victory?” Karkol chuckled seeing the ire build on Ambost’s and Takkas’ faces.

“Did she?” Takkas grated out.

“Apparently, yes.”

“And our forces obeyed her?”

“They obeyed the Seeker. Apparently all Ar-Thenna did was make the Vultoqi visible and vulnerable to our forces.”

“So it may not have been Ar-Thenna?” Ambost queried.

Karkol merely pointed to a screen at the edge of the room clearly showing Yr’ch grunts hailing a smiling goddess amidst the bodies of Vultoqi adelshaut.

“I rather suspect you’ll have a problem convincing our forces differently,” Karkol shrugged.

“This must be stopped!” Takkas screeched. “Ar-Thenna is not the goddess of the Yr’ch!”

“Then who is?” Karkol chuckled. “Certainly it doesn’t appear to be Beog.”

“Beog is not dead!”

“Where is he then?”

There was only silence as the Archimandrites who still supported Beog could not, as ever, come up with an answer to Karkol’s retort.

“Who else has seen this recording?” Ambost asked.

“Only we Beoghra,” Brnnt replied.

“It must stay that way; no one must even guess that Beog ... eludes our entreaties, for the moment.”

At this point the debate was interrupted by the entry of a Saltigue.

“Revered Archimandrites,” he began with a full from the waist bow. “A new video of Ar-Thenna and her disciples leading our forces has emerged onto the temple screens...” he tailed off looking at the screen in the chamber. “That one,” he pointed.

“I thought the TechnoYr’ch were dealing with this issue in that we can no longer switch off her broadcasts?” Karkol asked.

“They are struggling to find where the forces of Ar-Thenna have tapped into the power and datalines. The only place it can be cut is at the monitors themselves and they are difficult to access save for the maintenance drones. They would not understand why it needed to be unplugged as their minds do not work that way,” Ambost replied, looking embarrassed.

“In short Ar-Thenna is making the priesthood of Beog look bad. But our grunts led by her look good,” Karkol chuckled.

“We still know almost nothing about her,” Zorst noted. “We do not know what her aims for the Yr’ch are, nor what threat her allies pose.”

“Well, we knew about as much about Beog; though his aim for the Yr’ch to conquer all was well known and was bound to face some serious opposition from other realms eventually. Don’t forget that we almost came unstuck with our first attempt to conquer the Vultoqi as well,” Brnnt replied.

“We knew of no other realms that could have withstood us,” Zorst rebutted.

“Well, they found us and look at where we are now, less than a year later,” Brnnt shrugged.

There was silence as the Archimandrites took in that comment and cogitated on it.

“I believe it is time we politely asked the Seeker to come and brief us on this goddess and his observations of her,” Zorst stated.

“We can always ask, though I’d be careful of trying to apprehend him. At the moment only another Seeker might stand a chance of doing so and possibly destroy a lot of the landscape in attempting it,” Brnnt nodded.

“For the life of me I cannot understand why we created them,” Takkas snorted. “Their abilities far outstrip anything they would be required to investigate.”

“They came about because of this Council’s decision to not create any more Inquisitors but rather use the abilities of the more intelligent of our Adepts to fill this role. After all, at the time, a member of the Beoghra could have snuffed one out easily ... until we lost our powers,” Karkol explained.

“That and they were infinitely more patient than an Inquisitor and had a tendency to leave suspects alive for later questioning,” Brnnt chuckled.

“Yet now they are a threat to the regime,” Zorst grimaced.

“Hardly, their loyalty is not suspect, even if most have guessed Beog is no more,” Karkol noted.

“The one on Vultoq appears now to be a follower of this Ar-Thenna,” Takkas spat.

“This does not make him a threat to the regime, merely to those of the Beoghra who might take it upon themselves to try and kill him, something which the regime may now regret,” Brnnt shrugged.