The Conquering Queen

Chapter Three - The Belly of the Beast Pt. 3

It took Titus very little time to pry a section of the metal flooring up. They knew the sound of their footsteps would bring those creatures back upon them, and so they moved quickly. Below the metal sheeting was a support beam, and below that, darkness.

But not complete darkness. All around them, circlets of blue and purple lights marked the periphery of an enormous chamber ten storeys tall. Each twinkling light stood at the barred entrance to a cave-like chamber.

"Cages?" Billie guessed, looking at Polly. "A prison?" 

Polly narrowed her eyes. "Anything that needs to be caged is here against its will," she stated. "We must learn how they transport - whatever it is in there. We will depart the same way their charges arrive."

"Discuss below," Titus told them. "This corridor is not safe." 

"I'm not sure it's safe down there either." Billie pointed across the abyss. Several storeys down, a metal cart slid along a walkway, led by two men wielding pikes. Humans. Billie didn't know what to make of it. "Myceneans?" she hissed.

"It doesn't matter," Polly stated flatly. "They are only two. We will subdue them and question them." Titus nodded. They descended into the hole and replaced the slab of floor behind them.

It was a short trip across the ceiling beam to the top storey walkway. Titus led the way, making for the stairway at the end of the aisle of cages. Billie glanced into the caves as they moved, noting most of them were empty. Each cave had nothing inside but an upright cabinet lined with lights and levers, and a pair of slick manacles. 

The first occupied cell made Billie freeze. The woman inside looked human, but wrong. Her skin was pale and frozen, and her flesh had been scored with deep black scars. Her empty eyes stared back at Billie from behind garish red hair. 

"Hello?" Billie whispered, but the woman just stared, like a marionette with no strings. "What are you?"

"Billie," Polly put a hand on her shoulder. "Keep moving." The puppet-woman tracked them as they moved on.

The cells grew more and more occupied as they descended. The people within were, like the first woman, empty - often unconscious, as if someone had hollowed them out and left nothing but skin. Some were connected to the cabinets of light and wire by tubes inserted into the flesh, and others bore signs of recent wounds: as if parts of them had been cut off, and recently reassembled.

"Polly," Billie hissed, "I think they were once-"

"I know," Polly replied, staring straight ahead. "But they are not any longer."

The men with the cart were just below them now, and though they were walking, they looked no more alive than the people in the caves. Bright blue tubes coursed through their bodies, showing at joints and intervals where bisected limbs were improperly re-attached. From their size and build, Billie knew they had once been drones - Pythian warriors. Billie felt sick. Who did this to you?

Subdue, Polly signed to Titus, who nodded and cartwheeled over the ledge with no further ado. Billie dashed after him, hanging on to the edge to watch from above. Silent and steady as ever, Titus swung around the railing, planting his boot in the first man's temple, sending him crashing into the wall. A blade of flame appeared in the hand of the second, but Titus ducked and toppled him off his feet with a sweep of his leg instead. With his foot on the second man's chest, he was reaching for his pack when a voice cut the silence:

"No! Kill them! Kill them now, before they can send for reinforcements!"

"Do it," Polly confirmed. Billie looked around, baffled. The voice was male, gruff, and could only have come from inside one of the cells. Titus responded to Polly's order with unthinking precision. Both of the strange men were headless ten seconds later.