Janine reached the massive steel gates leading inside the tower in under a minute. The Taleteller gifted the steel a kiss, bending tons of steel within, and Janine pushed herself inside, greeted by the automatic fire of the defenders. It rained against her armor like pebbles, barely making the warlord even register the fifty guards assembled before her. She grabbed one, cursing at hearing the howling screams, and quickly clenched the fist, killing the woman. Dammit, her armor was still hot. Restraint! Restraint, you moron! These people did nothing to your son—no torture!
The Taleteller cleaved through the heads of three other guards, the butt of her axe came down on the fourth before the shaman joined the fray. Her jaws opened, Impatient One bit away a guard’s head, taking the headless body and theatrically chewing on it, allowing rivers of crimson to fall on the terrified guards.
“Shaman,” Janine sighed, stomping a foe before her into the ground. Her daughter’s claws cut the soldiers who had pointed their rifles at her, and Impatient One casually threw the severed heads into her mouth. “Cannibalism is forbidden.”
“The Blessed Mother is doing it.”
“And if Ravager would jump into plasma again, would you follow her example, shaman?”
“Maybe. Depends on if the Blessed Mother orders me to do it or not.”
I fucking hate you sometimes, Yennifer. Janine smirked weakly. She, too, had a taste for human flesh. In a sort of way, this was ingrained into her very psyche from the first days when she was first put in pits and had a taste of the other cubs’ flesh. Back in her days, the fights would often stop with a cub dying; it was simply the nature of things. You ended a life; you ate it, allowing the deceased tribe member to live through you. These practices always horrified the ice boys and girls, who kept their own cubs away from the tribe.
Normies of the state and the Dynast himself viewed eating deceased enemies as something abhorrent. Fools. It’s not like the Wolf Tribe eats prisoners. Meat is always meat. But orders were orders, no matter how stupid they were. If the big guy and the Blessed Mother wanted them to stop eating human flesh, they will stop eating human flesh.
“No more.” Janine’s blade stopped at the shaman’s gorget, and Impatient One allowed a corpse to fall from her claws, hungrily looking at the remaining guards.
The foes surrendered, less than thirty strong, after Anissa and her soldiers broke in. Janine said nothing to either of her daughters, coming directly to a man with the markings of an officer. Deciding against grabbing him, Janine pushed her snout closer, enjoying the fear in his eyes at the sight of her fangs.
“Lead us to the Techno-Queen, little man.”
“Only if you promise to sh-show mercy to my troops,” the guard replied, clanking his teeth in horror.
“Granted. On my word, if it is within my power, I will ensure the safety of your troops”
The terrified guards escorted the wolfkins toward a massive, industrial lift clearly meant to house a steel servant. Walking around corridors made of steel, Janine caught herself at the thought that even here, in the supposed palace of their enemy, the air felt acrid, slightly tearing at her throat. She saw laborers or servants, men and women in white hazmat suits with steel collars around their necks. When asked, the guard explained that these were the engineers. Should any of them try to leave the tower, the device on their necks would go off, ensuring that none would share the secrets of this place.
I’d tore my head off straight away. Or would screw with production. Janine decided, sending a message to Dragena. Normies have teams meant for disarming the slave collars. Shouldn’t be a problem. They kept on walking, and Janine noticed dozens of cameras spread across the place, looking like human eyes. Stepping inside the massive elevator, they were met with even more eye-cameras. The guard officer pressed a button, and the elevator moved up.
Janine expected a trap. She expected the elevator to fall, to explode, or for poison and acid to come from the walls. She fully expected to be met with rows after rows of steel minions above and to have to cleave her way straight through them. But nothing of the sort has happened.
The elevator carried them to the middle of the tower. Janine looked out of the open lift shaft, seeing hundreds of steel minions buzzing around on the other floors. She saw steel servants in a half-assembled state, humans were busy crafting overcomplicated limbs and parts even during the fall of their city. None of the workers here even dared to look at the Wolfkins; they were too terrified of the robots observing their every step. Once the elevator arrived at the control floor, the terrified captain of the guard led them to another set of steel doors.
There were no traps, no sudden ambush, and no attack. The doors opened, and the group stepped inside a chamber of steel, inhaling pristine, recycled air. Their target was inside, sitting on the opposite side of a massive chamber. Her throne is one of simple steel, placed on a dais, with a series of softly humming databanks and servers located to her left and right. Steel tiles made in the shape of a rhombus covered the floor in an orderly manner. The ceiling’s decorations comprised a golden disc and two brown half-discs. The Tecno-Queen herself looked like a young woman, dressed in a light exosuit to her neck, with a purple cape coming from her shoulders. A golden crown with a red ruby in the center held her short brown hair in place while her mocking eyes looked at the intruders.
“My queen.” The captain fell to his knees. “I am sorry, but…”
“Stop posturing, Bors!” the woman replied, looking over the Wolfkins as if they were curious insects. “You think you could’ve brought them here without my knowledge? If they are here, it is because I allowed it.”
“Techno-Queen,” Janine said, stepping forward and bringing the head of her axe against the floor, sending a tremor across the room in a silent threat. “Your city has fallen. Your kingdom is in shambles. You have no choice but to surrender…”
“Well, you sure got two out of three correct.” The woman cut her off, yawning. “This place is a wreck, true. I have little use for its continuous existence.”
“My queen?” Bors raised his head.
“Yes, you heard it right, Bors. Have you looked outside?” The woman pressed something on her throne, and a video screen appeared behind her back, showing the toxic surroundings of the capital. “Who in their right mind would have wanted to rule over shit with a side of shit?”
“But you did this…” the guard struggled to find words. “My queen, you yourself unleashed the poison on our lands!”
“Of course I did, you moron!” The image on the screen behind the woman changed to show the ruined remains of the steel servants and a few more servants still engaged in battle with the warlords. With a smug smile, the Techno-Queen looked at Janine. “This. All of this place was nothing more than a testing facility for me to get a grip on my power. Instinctively, I know how to assemble even the most complex machinery, but what good is a talent or power is if you don’t polish it, am I right?” She stood up. “The designs that showed promises are being saved even now; the pathetic ones are being discarded. Not counting your freakish mommy, you and your ilk are some of the strongest abnormals in the known world. And here I am, creating, with bootleg technology and subpar resources, machines that can make you sweat a little. And I’ve done all of this in under twenty years! Just imagine what I can make with proper funding and personnel. Any country will gladly take me in! How about it, warlord Janine…”
“I didn’t say my name,” Janine cut her off coldly.
“No, you did not, mutant.” The woman, looking like a cub against the massive warlord, smiled carelessly. “I own everything here, doggie. Man, woman, child—all are mine to spend as I see fit. So here is my offer. Face up against my latest invention. Should you win, I…”
“You are not in the position to make demands.” Janine gripped the Taleteller with both paws.
“Am I, though? Foolish doggie, haven’t you been listening to a word I spoke, haven’t you been using your eyes even a tiny bit?” The woman theatrically took a breath. “Fine, I’ll spell it out for you, moron. Try to act funny, and every person in my factories goes boom. You’ve seen steel minions on the way here, right? Well, guess what I have in the other factories and towers? Disobey me, and they, along with steel servants, will be unleashed against your rabble claiming new lives. Oh sure, they’ll lose; I am not delusional, but it will be a hollow victory, no? Dead soldiers, dead city… On the other hand, should you win, I’ll gladly surrender.” The Techno-Queen raised a finger over a button on her throne. “So, which one of the two choices do you prefer?”
“There is a third possibility. I can kill you before your finger moves an inch.” Janine warned her, and the Tecno-Queen only laughed back.
“You can certainly try,” she said icily. “This complex is fully automated. Go on, swing your axe, and find out how fast your reactions and speed are in comparison to the defensive mechanisms made by yours truly. Feel free to flip that coin, but I assure you, all it would bring to you is disappointment. The people die, your soldiers suffer, I’ll stay alive, and you’ll still dance under my tune.”
Janine pondered for a moment, buying time to allow her wounds to close. In truth, there wasn’t much of a choice here. What good is land if there are no people? True, the Reclamation Army eradicated those who stayed in their path, but aside from their earliest days, when gruesome and unforgivable mistakes were made, they never committed any genocide, never eradicated any culture or nation fully. Cruel cultures, like that of Orais, were made to tone down their violence, but otherwise were left alone. The Dynast made his will clear. All are to be integrated into the state and not wiped out. One nation. One world. Countless cultures and people. And no threat of another Extinction. Such was the goal of the Reclamation Army.
Thus, it was her duty to save the locals. Janine grimaced, faking anguish at her decision and feeding the ego of the Techno-Queen. The Wolf Tribe’s members were not a regenerator-type new breed, at least not fully. Their strength lay in getting stronger with each battle against a new and stronger foe, until one day they reached their peak, like Janine had reached hers. As they grow in power, so too does their healing, allowing them to shrug off some injuries and recover stamina rapidly in mid-combat.
Feeling the burns on her knees and legs dissolving, Janine grinned widely, opening her jaws slightly.
“Agreed.”
She barely had time to finish the sentence before an attack came from above. A golden disc fell from the ceiling, changing into a humanoid form the size of a warlord. Back-jointed legs kicked, sending Janine rolling across the surface to avoid a strike. Arms, ending up with straight blades, struck at the warlord, aiming for her neck.
She parried the hit, taking both blades on the shaft of Taleteller. Immediately, the robotic foe struck with his leg, grasping the warlord around the knee with force enough to dent her armor. The machine tried to jerk her to the side before Janine tried to headbutt it.
The machine jumped back, using her knee as a springboard. It came back on her, making a feint with the right arm and striking with the left. Janine saw through this obvious ploy and sidestepped the incoming thrust, stepping on the blade and bringing the Taleteller to the machine’s left shoulder, shattering its pauldron and breaking the blade beneath her leg. No. It broke the blade. Janine jumped back, acting on instinct, and evaded two more blade arms that came from within the golden chest. The machine purposely twisted its own limb to break the blade and gain freedom, evading the full brunt of her might, all the while enduring the warlord’s hit in order to make a trade with her.
“Not bad for a tin-can,” Janine said to the golden-colored robot.
They came at each other, and Janine allowed herself to be on the defensive, examining the movements of her foe, ignoring the sparks that flew in all directions each time Janine’s axe came down on the blades. The machine was fast, easily keeping up with her. Its sturdiness was not up to par, and Janine could see the large marks left by her axe and gears working within. The constant hail of attacks reminded Janine of the amateurish swordsman from the Ice Fang order. For fun, she and he came against each other, with Janine using a club and the ice boy wielding two swords. For the entire fight, he used nothing else but thrusts, aiming to make her bleed with the point of his blades and ending up having his swords broken.
And the machine used the same movements. It had a rudimentary knowledge of feints and deceptions, and its use of legs was quite unusual. The moment the machine caught Janine’s axe with two swords, it would always go for a kick, aiming at the cracks in her armor. But this pattern left it predictable, and Janine allowed her axe to fall into a trap, kicking forth with the claws of her own left leg and sending the machine rolling against the metal floor. It jumped right back on, leaking sparks from a crack on its wrists. A tingle of pain shot through the warlord’s leg after a step. Looking down, she saw that the toe’s claw had been shattered.
“How about we increase the fun?” the Techno-Queen snapped her fingers.
Two other disks fell from the ceiling, changing mid-flight into the same humanoid-shaped figures, albeit of a smaller size and different color. Aside from the size, all three looked like twins. Same lean limbs, lacking rough curves aside from pauldrons, same four limbs with blades at the end. Their heads were small and round, and four lenses were constantly trailing each movement of the warlord.
The machines didn’t come on her at once, forming a triangle around her. Janine noticed that the steel-covered machines moved slower; they jumped toward the warlord and aimed for her sides to create an opening for a golden one. So. He is your warlord. Janine took a breath, moving around the room, blocking the thrusts coming at her from all sides. These machines pushed her to the limit, forcing the warlord to put her all into the calm concentration of a deadly dance as she was blocking and deflecting the incoming attacks.
“Agreed. Wolf Hag, shaman!” Janine roared and charged at the golden one. The time for balance has come and gone.
Her daughters came upon the steel ones, leaving Janine against the golden. The machine twitched, registering a shift in their dance a second too late. The butt of Janine’s axe came into the machine’s head, denting two out of four lenses in. She grabbed the robot, charged along with it into a wall, and splattered its form against the wall. Immediately, the warlord retreated, evading the three thrusts aimed at her lungs. She struck with her axe, landing a crisscrossed attack and hacking deep into the steel body. The first slash left the machine trembling. The second opened it from shoulder to waist, allowing two parts to fall to the ground in streams of smoke and spill out fibers of artificial muscles.
Her daughters feigned weakness, coming back-to-back, before dodging to the side and changing their opponents mid-fight. Impatient One buried her claws into the shoulders of her opponent, biting away its head before stomping on the twitching remains. Anissa caught the incoming thrusts in a lock, breaking two of the machine’s limbs and grabbing its legs in a lock with her own. Using the foe’s own torn limbs, the wolf hag speared the robot’s body with them.
“Bravo!” the Techno-Queen clapped, standing up and running down the stairs of her throne like a girl. “Bravo! What a magnificent performance! It seems even tungsten alloy has failed to make a difference. Tch, and I had such hopes for it…” She took a small portable terminal from underneath her cape and started furiously typing.
“You don’t seem to be mad about your loss,” Janine noted, looking at the blade of her axe and coming closer to the woman. With the broken lens of her helmet, she sent the woman’s exact location to Zero and Alpha.
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“Why should I be? No matter how sound a theory is, empirical methods are needed for any real advancement to happen! Science, even unnatural science like my own, feeds off practical results. These machines almost matched you in speed; in time, I’ll make the ones that can…”
Janine struck. Her axe moved up, tearing through the air with an ear-piercing sound. The sheer movement of her upward strike sent shockwaves that cartwheeled the guards against the walls. No matter, they’ll have a few broken bones, but they’ll survive. This one, however… Too dangerous. Such pristine talent and not a hint of humanity behind it.
The blade stopped a meter before the lean neck, meeting some unseen wall that made the Taleteller tremble in the warlord’s arms.
“I already said. Not delusional,” the Techno-Queen said off-handedly, still typing something on her terminal. “I’ve accounted for every eventuality, fool.”
A wave of force sent Janine back. She felt a strike against her organs, gulped down, choking on her own drool. A piercing pain grasped her chest when the blood within her body shifted its direction for a moment, going in reverse. Gravity. Janine’s eyes widened. Her daughters threw acid grenades that created a dome around the woman, with the droplets of deadly acid harmlessly sliding down the bent gravity around her.
And with the realization came fear. The Wolf Tribe, for all their savagery, were pack-based people. In times when even a warlord could not hunt a foe on her own, they always sought help. Janine was unsure that she could kill the bitch in time, so she linked her vision with that of her allies, allowing them to strike with pin-point accuracy. Fear changed to horror. Horror changed into pure terror, coloring some of Janine’s fur white as Warlord Alpha’s fear wave passed through her.
Alpha, the strongest warlord, had a secondary power. Many people felt uneasiness or fear coming closer to her and dismissed this as simply a byproduct of her horrid visage. In truth, Alpha passively emanated fear, potent enough to cause a cardiac arrest even in the bravest of humans. Unlike most powers, hers was a passive one, the one that was always active. Through constant iron self-control, Alpha learned how to keep most of the fear locked within her body, releasing it partially like a whip. And now she released it like a bullet, and the mere touch of it caused Janine to release her bowels.
The Techno-Queen only laughed, pressing her hand to her mouth as another beam came from behind Janine, a black energy beam released by Warlord Zero’s rifle. The stream of energy harmlessly dissipated against the gravity shield, leaving the woman unharmed.
“The most productive distraction.” The woman pointed at her crown. “What, you expected me not to be prepared for the obvious danger of mental power? Nah, doggie, I won’t die so easily, nor will I ever be a slave to someone’s will. With this.” The Tecno-Queen pointed at the massive servers next to her throne. “I have all the data needed to perfect my creations and all the proof for any warlord to beg me to join them. I say this test polygon served its purpose. Time to level the place and make my exit.”
“Level, queen?” the guard captain asked, limping closer to the queen.
“Oh, please, Bors. Did any of you really think that I would allow anyone in the region to live after what you bastards did to my parents?”
“But… queen, it happened over fifty years ago. There is no person alive who even saw that horrific sacrifice!”
“And this should matter, why?” The Techno-Queen tilted her head in confusion. “I made a promise to make you all pay, and what better way than to squeeze all who live on these lands dry in service to me? Speaking of service, I think I remember you sending your son to me… Some two years ago, in fact…” She pressed two fingers to her lips.
“What. Have. You. Done?” The guard tore off his cowl and helmet, looking at his queen with the pale face.
“Watch and see, loyal Bors. It’s time to test one more of my inventions while we are at it.” The woman smiled, and the steel walls around the chamber shifted, revealing horror.
Janine saw many things in her life. She saw cubs in her tribe die from hunger. She saw entire villages devoured by malformed. Janine had seen torture in the slaver camps, where cruel masters were making an example of the most troubling slaves for the rest to see. She remembered how Warlord Terrific worked her magic, brutally torturing a few guards by tearing away their bones with her elongated fingers to break the morale of an entire settlement.
But never before had she seen anything close to this place of madness. People, living people, littered the wall, held by razor-sharp harnesses that never allowed their wounds to close. The limbs of all of them were missing; some had peeled off skin, showing needles coming into their lungs. Others gurgled weakly, twitching as strange fluids came down their throats. All the people here had their eyes and ears removed, and all of them were either gagged or had their vocal cords removed, showing the naked insides of their throats. They were bleeding; the blood gathered in a small round space near the wall, and the force field had kept the horrifying smell of excrement and blood away from the chamber itself.
“Like what you see, doggies?” the woman asked cheerfully.
“You…” the captain choked, falling on his knees and looking at one figure on the wall. A normie cub lacking both arms and legs, his eyes removed, but blood still coming from the eye sockets. “What… What is the meaning of this? You have promised us that our children will be riders…”
“And you believed me? Bors, you are such an idiot. I’d pity you, but…” The Techno-Queen laughed, placing a hand to her mouth as the captain shouted in wordless rage.
The man jumped to his feet, his hand found a pistol on his belt. Still screaming, shouting his pain and grief to the world, he pointed at the queen. And she only smiled. The man fell on his knees, his body being crashed by the gravity pull. Crouching, he tried to crawl to the woman, before the pull splattered Bors against the floor. He screamed, this time from physical pain. His eyes popped, liquidated by his own bones that were in turn becoming bone dust. The Techno-Queen kept smiling, looking at how her former captain was turning into a pool of blood at her feet.
Janine groaned, struggling to stand on her legs. She experienced the unseen hooks and scalpels ripping away her skin, and she also felt the sharp needles piercing her lungs, filling them with searing hot acid that kept burning with no relief or stop. Her brain was on fire, a vibration stimulated pain centers in her body, the arms twitched, feeling the limbs long lost as sharp edges of the harness….
I am feeling their pain. Janine had to force herself to believe that her eyes still existed. The pain of every person on the walls in this chamber came down on them, threatening to choke the life out of the Wolfkins and leaving the terrified guards alone. Anissa and Impatient One grabbed their sides, tearing at their own armors in an attempt to stop the itch in their lungs, while the scouts simply howled in pain.
“How dare you?” Janine looked at the woman, taking a step to the throne on her wobbly legs. “Your own people…”
“Oh, please, everyone is always on about the people when it is their turn.” The Techno-Queen frowned her nose. “Where was all this lot when my parents were dragged out and burned at a stake to satiate some deity’s wrath, huh? No fucker ever saved them! I saved myself, and now that I am the one in control, I am suddenly supposed to be the first to stop? Screw that. These bastards will pay for what their ancestors did.” The Techno-Queen looked at the surrounding horror. “Do you like my wondrous invention? The idea for it came to my head as I pleaded, begged all the gods in the universe to let me take the pain of my family as they were burning at the stake. But the universe fell silent, so it fell to me to remedy this mistake. This device is all around us; it transmits every single emotion these sacks of flesh feel straight into your little brain. And not only that, but this device also records every feeling of pain, artificially inflated with special drugs, and can unleash all of this at a moment’s notice!”
Janine took another step, feeling it to be the hardest step in her life. Her missing… no! Real, her real arm struggled to hold the Taleteller. She wet herself, feeling a rising pain in her bowels. Biting her tongue, Janine tried to focus on this real pain, only to find it indistinguishable from the pain coming from the people on the wall. Against her will, the warlord started crying like a cub, still walking to end this bitch.
One step. And another. Just thirty or so, and she can wipe the smirk off that smile. A step. Another one. Janine steeled herself, forcing her body to advance. She took another step forward, sensing something strange, and stumbled, falling on one knee. Before Janine’s very eyes, her armor rusted. She felt blood coming from every single orifice in her body as the veins in her paws and neck started popping.
“Or this type of weapon,” the woman said. “Pure, one hundred percent oxygen is coming straight to you, contained around your body with a simple shield. I came to this idea after hearing the saying: ‘Healer, heal yourself’. We can’t live without oxygen—well, not unless you heavily modify your body. But in large enough quantities, pure oxygen is deadly, even for you. Do you feel your limbs becoming paralyzed? Good.” The woman walked back to her throne, spreading her cape around the seat. “Now then, onto a main dish! Ravager! You cowardly, useless whore! I challenge you! Come forth, or you’ll find your cl…”
The tower shuddered. A new corridor appeared where once stood the elevator. An entire section of the tower behind Janine disappeared, and tons upon tons of rock and steel started falling on the ground. The ground beneath Janine bulged, pushed out by a simple, casual step of a being that had entered this room. Janine slid away from an area filled with pure oxygen, ending next to the massive legs. The Techno-Queen challenged Ravager.
And the Blessed Mother responded.
The Dominator of Dominators stepped inside the room, lips twitching, showing fangs from time to time, drool running down her jaw. Her amber pupils kept dilating and shrinking, struggling to focus on her target. Passing by Anissa, she released her claws, and Impatient One groaned, leaping forward and dragging her sister away from the fury that was Ravager.
“Finally,” the Techno-Queen said, clapping once. “Famous Ravager. You know, you and I are quite similar. Like you, I too have suffered…”
“I have no time listening to your sob life stories, tyrant,” Ravager spat, anger washing away from her snout. A moment ago, a wild beast stood in the room. Now, as she lowered herself on four legs, the Blessed Mother looked far scarier.
Ravager wiped the drool from her chin, breathing out the air. Steam, partially crimson from the blood of the fallen, came from her mouth, hiding her eyes for a moment. The pain left Janine and the others at the simple gesture from the woman on the throne. Ravager trembled violently as she experienced the sufferings of hundreds of people, amplified by the machine to the greatest extent.
Janine cast her axe at the foe with all her might. It flew through the entire hall, ricocheting off the shield around the throne and making an arc, falling at Ravager’s paws. A single tap with a claw made Janine stand at attention, showing her neck for daring to interfere with Ravager’s hunt.
“Pot calls out kettle.” The Techno-Queen smiled thinly. “If I am the tyrant, then the same can be said about your own master, doggie.”
“Dynast is a benevolent dictator who brings prosperity where there was none. You are a tyrant who sucks the life out of everything to satiate her vanity and leaves ruins in her wake. You are not the same.” Ravager responded calmly, shaking off the suffering like water from the fur.
The Blessed Mother walked forward, stopping once and inhaling air loudly. The Techno-Queen’s smile turned into a grimace of hatred after Ravager walked through the cocoon of pure oxygen unimpeded. A snap of fingers made the metal below Ravager bulge when the gravity generator sent wave after wave of reversed gravity into the commander’s body. The blood flow reversed, breath refused to leave lips, and hundreds of tons weighed down the gigantic body…
Ravager kept looking at her foe, taking two more steps and exhaling hardly. Licking her lips, she spoke: “This is the problem with people like you. You had a hard life, too bad, so sad. But you never ask yourself a simple question. What if not? What if I won’t be mindlessly bringing revenge on innocent people like a bitch? What if my fucking overly complicated plan will be undone by a simple act of raw might because, in my arrogance, I have failed to calculate something? What if there will be nothing to catch me when I fall because I am a monster?”
“Lecturing me, aren’t you, beast?” The Techno-Queen laughed. “Well, maybe so, but unlike your precious Dynast and you, I will be remembered, doggie.” The screen behind her came to life, showing the city, and the woman raised her finger. “Have you ever considered why, knowing of your arrival and your army, I stayed here instead of running? It’s because I wanted you here! I have planted a plasma bomb here, powerful enough to eradicate this miserable excuse of a city along with everything for miles! Only I survive, protected by the shield, and once the dust is settled, I’ll pack up my things.” She lovingly caressed the data banks near her. “Power is but a means to an end, you stinking dog. And my current end is killing you. After that? Who knows? Maybe I’ll enlist in Dynast’s service and take over from within.”
Janine wanted to rash ahead, to break her paws on the invincible shield around the woman. She howled, a wordless stream of shame for her failure to preserve the lives of her packs and the civilians whom they were supposed to save. Jumping back, she grabbed Impatient One and Anissa, preparing to say what she always felt in her heart and address her scouts, apologizing for…
Ravager inhaled the air. The Techno-Queen changed in face, looking at her throne. Her finger pressed the button again and again, more nervously with every touch. Grabbing her terminal, the woman scrolled to something with the trembling fingers.
“What is happening? Where is…”
“In the mesosphere,” Ravager replied, walking toward the throne. “I sensed that something was amiss. Why would anyone need so much toxic waste in the capital city? Trusting my intuition, I prowled around and found your bomb, sending it way above before replying to your call.”
“W… wait.” The Techno-Queen’s eyes became round upon seeing how Ravager pushed her snout through the impregnable shield, her motion overloaded several generators within the throne. The ruler became white with horror upon the realization that her shield had just gone offline and Ravager’s drool was falling on her clothes.
“You said you wanted to be remembered? You will be. As a footnote in the history books. A fool whose vanity and wounded pride caused countless deaths, a sad joke to serve as a lesson. Dynast will be known forevermore.”
“We can make a deal!” The woman pleaded. “I can make you into a ruler! Why serve Dynast? With me at your side, your name will ring in every corner of the world, millions will pray to you as if you were a god! We can…”
“Couldn’t care less.” Ravager’s jaws closed on the Techno-Queen’s head. The woman thrashed madly, trying to pry open the jaws with her feeble arms, before her body went mad like a headless cusack. Ravager stood up on two legs, gulping down the head and shoulders, leaving the remains to topple down the stairs, spreading crimson rivers along the stairs.
The Blessed Mother turned around, the mad look once more in her eyes. Looking at the guards, she growled, hungrily dropping drool on the floor. Janine remembered what Alpha and Lacerated One once told her about the Blessed Mother—about the reason she rarely takes on the cities alone. The bloodlust could overtake her, and unless stopped, the entire settlement could be desolated like a lizard coop.
Ravager walked toward the people, speeding up with every step, and Janine threw herself at the Blessed Mother, wrapping her arms around her waist and feeling her legs slide helplessly. Ravager felt unstoppable, like a natural disaster in the action, one that would never be satiated unless it claimed enough sacrifices.
“It is over!” Janine gasped for air, feeling Ravager’s index claw scratching against her ribs. When did she… “It is over! We won! They surrendered!”
“It…” The Wolfkin came to a halt, looking at the warlord with dilated pupils. “Over?”
“Yes. Yes, Blessed Mother! We won.”
“I am no one’s mother.” Ravager pulled her claw out in a torrent of blood. Janine felt how the blood ran down her waist, mixing with sweat and excrement on her legs, before coming out through openings on her feet. Lowering herself on a knee, Ravager licked Janine’s wound, bringing immediate succor, and stormed back to the throne. “Shaman! Secure the prisoners! Wolf hag! Tell First to send in medic teams ASAP. And tell Dragena to get Till Ingo and Dynast on a three-way call.”
Not paying any attention to the corpse, Ravager walked to the throne, finding the Techno-Queen’s terminal. Comically biting her tongue from her efforts, Ravager clumsily typed something on the terminal with her oversized fingers, and the wailing of the victims on the walls stopped. For a second, Janine thought that the commander had administered euthanasia before she noticed that the ruined bodies were still breathing and still bleeding, but for now their sufferings have ended as sleep has overtaken them.
“Done,” Ravager said, putting away the terminal. She looked at the corpse, murmuring to herself: “No, discipline, discipline, Ravy. Setting an example. It is over. Even if they clone her, without a brain, she’ll be an entirely different person.”
“Commander,” Janine dared to speak. “What just happened?”
“Eh?” Ravager looked at her, scratching behind her ear. “Just guessed the password and how this thing works. Simple, really; anyone could do it.”
But... you can’t read. Questions for later. Janine decided, holding one paw over her wound. Perhaps there was something about shamans’ tales. Just standing here, in Ravager’s presence, she felt divinity—an almost unnatural heavenly bliss that demanded worship and adoration. Struggling, the warlord said: “Commander, I have some tokens. It’s not much, but perhaps we can pay for augmetics to at least for cubs…” She looked at the people on the wall.
“No.” Ravager shook her head, sitting on the throne. The metal bent beneath her attempts to fit in, slowly turning into a flat surface. “Thought about it already. Way too many parts need to be replaced. Engineers won’t do. We need the help of whitecoats… doctors,” she growled with pure hatred, clenching her paws to the point that blood poured between her fingers. Taking a few breaths, Ravager massaged her temples. “I… have someone in Iterna who owes me a lot. An angel of sorts. But I doubt even she could fund enough cloning parts and Iterna is rather stingy with whom they help.” Ravager smiled and patted the databanks. “Therefore we’ll make Dynast fund the help in exchange for the bitch’s knowledge.”
“But…” Janine looked at the databanks, picking up her axe. She looked at the hanging cripples and remembered the death and destruction that had been caused to this region. “Commander, is it wise? To obtain this knowledge…” She pointed at the walls with her axe. “This woman destroyed an entire region, tortured countless innocents. We are supposed to heal the world, in what way can her wicked research help with that?”
“At ease,” Ravager interrupted her, folding her paws. “Janine… right? Knowledge is…” A grimace of pain came upon her snout, disappearing just as fast. “Knowledge. It is neither bad nor good. It is the way you gain this knowledge can be bad. She went the wrong way about it and paid the price. But the deed is done. I have a choice. Either destroy it and let the victims either die or live a hellish existence. In the future, someone else will rediscover it. Or I can give it away, giving them a new chance at life and maybe helping Mr. Ingo bring about some breakthroughs in the robotics field. Ultimately, it is my choice to make, but I understand your concerns.” The corners of her lips sank.
“I will obey,” Janine said, putting her axe on her shoulder and feeling how her bleeding slowly stopped. “If you forgive me my words, com… Ravager.” She quickly corrected herself after a glance. “I believe you are making a mistake. Show mercy to these people. End their sufferings and destroy this cache of evil.”
“You’re a sweet girl, Janine. But life is hard and unfair, and to make it easier for the weak, we have to compromise. It is our duty. Now leave me be. I am sleepy. And my head hurts. Please don’t wake me ever ag…” Ravager trailed off, breathing hard. Blinking once, she focused on Janine. “Tell them to wake me up when Dynast answers.”
Saying that, Ravager closed her eyes and snorted, falling asleep like a cub, surrounded by countless tortured and maimed people locked on the walls.