Hydraheads

Chapter 5: Vaudeville Finale

The floating fortress scrambled for the ancient North Pole. Its formidable shape was at the center of a task group composed of various antigravity ships. All of them easily traversed the shallow seas before passing the decimated coasts.

"I've seen things our descendants wouldn't believe. Parasitic bioweapons smaller than the smallest cells spread plagues across megacities. Weapons of mass destruction that turn their victims into salt statues. I've seen the fall of Manjodaro, Rangiataya, and the Hollow Earth by the spreading Devil's Graveyard." The Obsidian Hydrahead, Trihton, stopped her lamentation. In her reptilian human soul-matrix form of a girl wearing a civilian leotard, she closed her eyes.

Different from her, Apellon who wore a similarly-tight costume elaborated the facts from his remote sensing. "Dyeus, Heusos, and their Holympick Spirits team have been abducted by the treasonable Greys. The clone soldiers have chained the heroes with singasteini stones with songs altered to break their will. The Serpo Hivemind wants them to be prime entertainment."

"Can we get them?" asked the concerned Njarduz to his right.

Apellon shook his head. "The Greys have shattered the stargate system. We have lost connection to multiple Galactic Federation colonies. Nebiru, Nisvana, Paradaijah, and the Seven Sister-Suns are out of touch."

The same scale of destruction and chaos was felt by Njarduz herself. The most horrifying of them all was the coming bulk of the Chaos Planet. It was huge, as huge as Saturn itself. Unlike the sun-star, the surface of this evil celestial object was churning with tumultuous hot gas and plasma. Various colors mixed and spread into bands of dark and light regions all over, but none could break the eye.

Njarduz gasped, then everyone gasped. The Chaos Planet's red eye was a massive storm. It was larger than Earth itself. It spun and swirled in almost a domineering manner. All of the heroes drowned in its terror. Someone squealed in dread.

It was Apellon of all people. He was losing his composure. The fingers of his spirit form trembled. "I don't know whether they would forgive our sins...."

Wotanaz roared. Everyone came back to their senses. "Let's make sure that our species will be allowed to have descendants after this first." The rainbow-haired team captain observed each of her teammates. She nodded. "We just passed the northernmost end of Alqabulan."

The heroic spirits glanced forward toward the shores of former Gondwanaland. Their minds assess the situation and possible threats. Njarduz the green warrior was there as a broad-shouldered girl with a honey skin tone. Her facial tattoo was silver in color. "The followers of Anatthemu have changed the weather pattern to bury the whole continent under a layer of snow as thick as a mammoth. Worse yet, their anomalistic weaponry has turned the snow itself into a predatory substance in many megacities, including Xukutako and Eildurathu. We can expect few to no survivors there. It also threatens the fringes of the Amassauna botanical garden, though its black earth soil is still potent to fight the corruption."

One of the escort vimana fighter ships erupted into burning wreckage. The shores were in ruin, but not abandoned. More of the aerial defense energy cannons opened fire. Some pagodaships returned the welcome with their arsenal.

Invisible radiation from cauldron-shaped bombards triggered artificial earthquakes that annihilated some of the coastal fortifications. Unnatural magma shift tunneled into new volcanic eruptions that also showered the nearby batteries with molten lava.

"Is that―" Njarduz couldn't finish her words. The coming Cimmerian shade was clearly a rolling avalanche of a snowstorm.

"We don't have time for this. Either their cannons or the hungry tempest will get us if we stay here!" exclaimed Neptonos.