12 Miles Below

There were days when her full focus was needed, and days where Relinquished could sit back and let her empire run itself. Today was not one of those days.

There were things to do and a plan to follow.

With Tsuya’s latest incursion foiled, the human goddess was forced back into hiding for another day, leaving her enough time to check in on progress.

One pale hand reached out and opened up the network, following coordinates back to the story she had taken a personal interest in. Her hand flickered through all the news updates from her various spy programs, each crowding her throne to showcase their progress.

A lot less than there used to be, Relinquished noted. To be expected given the situation. Unfortunately, it seemed the little To’Wrathh had taken a detour from her ultimate purpose.

Should she speed things up a bit? “Oh my dear Abdication.” Relinquished muttered, playing with a knight piece in her hand as she idly read through the notifications. There were already good pressures on her from the other three Feathers doing their job. But diamonds are not formed under weak pressure. “Perhaps she needs… one more nudge.”

Her list of Feathers came up, and she searched for the one in charge of the strata where her little game had moved to.

To’Naviris. One of her more degenerate Feathers, warped beyond fixing. He had been made in the earlier processes, when she was still polishing off the issues in her production line. As a result, he’d been sent deep underground, to lord over a section of the world she didn’t expect much trouble within. A caretaker for her stronger minions, kept in reserve. Certainly strong enough to handle a few Deathless, as he was already proving right at this moment.

He had left his general region, going into the outer regions of his domain. On a merry chase after a group of ten Deathless, according to her logs. It had been centuries since the last time humanity ever touched near his lands, of course the Feather was having fun with it.

It was still quite impressive to see how well he’d been able to get Deathless, of all foes, to run around on his orders. Rather resourceful little cockroach, perhaps she had judged him too harshly in the past.

The pale lady sighed, recognizing the tell-tale signs of another blindspot in her programming. She’d need to update how her systems ranked Feathers, as quite a few categories hadn’t been accounted for in their judgement.

Unfortunately, it was far too late now. He’d been on the stage for too long, which locked her down paths she did not particularly wish to travel through. If she had known his true nature and capabilities earlier on, she could have easily left him out of the plans entirely and gotten a different set of pressures for To’Wrathh to overcome.

One pale finger tapped the chess piece one final time, before she let it go, seeing the item vanish into dust. She found herself feeling particularly magnanimous today. Things were going according to plan, she could forgive one of her tools running amok like a dog chasing after treats.

To’Naviris would be far more traditional. That one she expected would act predictably. Multiple screens appeared before her, detailing a battle.

The Feather moved regally on a bed of small crab-like machines, arms crossed, posture straight as the wave of machines under him carried him like a king to his destination. Robes of a bishop covered his frame, delicate symbols in violet glowing across ribbons of silk. The machine wave under his feet slammed against a group of harassed humans, fighting back with gun, blade, explosions and occult.

Attempting to hold the tide off while the blast doors were slowly closing shut.

The Feather was laughing, an uncontrolled, unhinged laughter as he rained destruction on the scattered and flaggering defense. Hands stretched wide, speaking a sermon to the death of all living beings and reveling in the destruction before him. Relinquished watched with mild amusement. His victory was nearly assured, the blast doors were sealing shut too slowly, and the Feather would be claiming all of them within the minute.

She rewound it backwards. To where it started.

Before the chase. Before the explosions and the failed trap the Deathless had attempted. Here was as good a place as any. Her finger snapped, and the recording resumed in the correct direction.

To’Neviris chewed through his fingernail, his teeth snapping it in half. Nanoswarms were already streaming into his mouth, searching for the broken sections of his shell, despite the Feather’s continued display. He stood on his swarm of shoe-sized crab-machines, all of them skittering over one another, a constant carpet that moved while he remained an island standing at the center of the moving hill.

“Then, I take it you report their escape? To me?” He said. His voice carried a rasping, almost rattling like quality to it. The skittering creatures under the Feather moved as one, the mound drawing him up and closer to the machine making its doomed report.

One of her mid-tier units. A massive hulking machine with far greater mobility from the gravity fractals hidden within the carapace. It had been based on an aquatic creature from old earth, a predator with a ferocious appetite.

They had done well enough against the humans, even after the armors had become a plague. Relinquished had retired them to the lower levels to preserve their numbers.

“We are most apologetic, great one.” The cowering machine before the Feather spoke, limbs all bowed before him. “We caught four, but they halted our progress and the final six escaped past the blast doorway.”

Snap. Another fingernail cracked in the Feather’s mouth. He breathed deeply in and out, trying to bring his feelings back in line. Rage simmering within his neuromorphic mind.

A massive occult hand flared out of To’Neviris, three times the size of the Feather itself, and grabbed the unfortunate unit. Lifting it up, still squirming and terrified, the glowing translucent hand forced the lesser closer to the comparatively smaller Feather. The mound under To’Naviris lifted him up, while the occult hand lowered the lesser down. Until violet eyes were at the same level as the machine’s large insect-like ones.

“Thirty two thousand, three hundred and twenty seven lessers. All my kingdom to lead, all of the power to bear, a symphony of destruction - and you only manage to kill four?”

“Great one. I can still serve.” The guardian spoke, voice still calm despite the terror deep inside. “I can lead the ar-”

Another fingernail was bitten clear through by the Feather’s sharp teeth, the splinter flying out of his mouth. “No-nonono. I find you incapable of leading anything, as evidenced by this most… egregious failure.” To’Naviris said, giving his nanoswarms enough time to repair his finger while he spoke. “No. I grow tired of giving you lessers a chance.” Occult flared out in the room. The lesser’s carapace compressed as the glowing hand that held him flattened into the ground began to squeeze. Metal grinded against metal as internals were crushed, the violet lights flickered out across the lesser’s carapace. It looked like the machine had broken from an implosion.

That was when the Deathless made their move.

“Thanks for killing the big guy for us.” A voice in the shadows from above spoke, as two Deathless walked out of the balconies above. “Zenia and I were more worried about him than you.”

To’Neviris froze for a moment and so did every other mechanical crab crawling under him. One of his eyes turned on itself, looking to the top right. That eye narrowed down. And he began to laugh. Low one-syllable sound slowly repeating with no meaning.

The mechanical hoard under him all rotated, turning his shell slowly on itself until he faced the newcomers deep into the gloom above.

The Feather’s eyes bulged, irises widening and narrowing a few dozen times separately from one another in the span of two seconds. Until they both reached an agreement with each other, and the Feather finally smiled.

He stretched his arms out wide to each side, like a shepherd welcoming his flock, the smile growing far past where the normal mouth lines a human’s features would allow. “Welcome honored guests! To this most splendid occasion!”

Relinquished hummed in appreciation. A good show, to have the little humans wait in the darkness for their enemy to kill each other. It was slightly spoiled in her eyes, as the Deathless here had been fed exactly where To’Naviris would be and the pathway to getting to this little forward staging ground without being caught by the rest of the army.

But Relinquished could ignore that, she watched as her favorite part of any scene: The one where the heroes still had an ounce of hope in their plans, making one last desperate stand to defeat their foes.

She already knew it wouldn’t end well: They’d been given prior advice to flee and force the Feather to continue the chase. That meant their little guide in the shadows knew they wouldn’t survive a confrontation. Of course, controlling humans was impossible, and the little cockroach was about to learn his lesson.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

“Spare us the dramatics To’Naviris. We’re here to finish it.” The female Deathless said.

“Without your kindred? All alone?” The Feather asked, “Why, that won’t do at all Zenia. Would you be so kind as to summon them here? That we might all… bask in this moment?”

“Over my dead body.” She spat out, blades lighting up.

The Feather’s smile returned, and he laughed until nothing but ice remained in his final few words. “Well then. If death is truly thy longing… come claim it.”

The Deathless made a good show of it, fighting off the Feather as a pair, dodging the spears hidden within the moving carpet. One wielded the power of the sun itself, smiting the Feather with bolt after bolt of pure golden power, until they’d done enough and began a fighting retreat. Back through the twisting dream-like hallways of the mite cathedral, in the direction of that blast door To’Naviris’s lessers had failed to follow through.

To’Naviris followed after them in a fury, half upset that the humans were getting away, half terrified his fun would vanish behind another mite contraption. What happened instead were explosions littered across the retreat path, intended to break the swarm at his feet.

It had some results, and enraged the Feather further. The other Deathless ambushed To’Naviris as his carpet of remaining machines rolled him through the entrance. Mite-made weapons forced the Feather to trigger his shields, blue lances of energy ripping apart the swarm under his feet as a side casualty.

A pulse of occult rippled from the Feather as he lifted a pale hand and clenched the air. A large spike of pure metal ripped through the carpet of machines at the Feather’s feet and impaled one of the hidden attackers from the side, greatly staggering the man’s shields and throwing him out of the way. The rest of the Deathless stood and fought, all clearly aware that any caught within the roiling carpet of machines would be dragged, held down and have those spikes rip through their armor and chest. They’d seen it done before.

The battle turned against the human, as was inevitable. They retreated further, back to their original plan - falling through the recently reopened blast door at the end of the cathedral’s maze.

“What’s the matter humans? Afraid of the afterlife?” To’Naviris laughed, as an occult hand finally caught one of the Deathless mid-jump. Power flared out of the Deathless. The man attempted to pit his will against her Feather. The other Deathless instantly swapped fire from his carpet of machines onto the floating hand’s wrist.

It was too late. The transparent massive hand struggled in the air for a moment, then slowly crushed the man into paste.

The Deathless streamed past their final doorway, sealing it shut and triggering the blast doorway before them to begin closing operations. They aimed to hold this ground until the last second, and then slip through the doorway and shoot anything that tried to pass until the gate shut for good.

Their temporary entrance exploded out, the hinges breaking apart as the Feather rolled into the room, the carpet of machines behind him moving like a wave to carry To’Naviris into range. The nearest Deathless leaped out of the way a second too late. Once more the occult hand reached out and yanked the human out of the air, dragging him back a few feet before tossing him up again and taking a firmer grasp. A glowing hammer of occult blue was slapped out of the air by the Feather’s backhand, an explosion rocketing out from where the hammer finally landed.

“There’s no need to worry for your dead companions, you will see them again.” To’Naviris shouted with glee, one hand clutching the air before the captured Deathless, slamming the man back down into the ground. Then his voice ground down to a threatening whisper. “Because you're next.”

Crunch.

They didn’t manage to seal the doorway shut in time. To’Naviris strode through the opening, his carpet of machines catching two more Deathless as they fought and hacked away. In one final attempt, the final two dove deep into the mass of machines, one being swarmed almost immediately - but not before helping the other launch off directly for the Feather himself, attacks coming from all sides tearing away at the armor’s shields.

Up until he was stopped by one pale hand snapping forward, fingers curling down around the chestplate. The man swung his occult blade for To’Naviris’s throat, but that was intercepted by a dozen metal spikes ripping free from the carpet of machines under both of them, spearing through the Deathless just about everywhere. Including the sword hand swinging down.

To’Naviris took one deep satisfied breath as he let go of the dead man's armor. It remained suspended in the air, carried by all the spears that had punctured through, red blood already dripping down each. “What a lovely celebration.” The Feather said. “We are truly blessed to have such fine wine to spill this day. Truly blessed.”

“Indeed we are.” Relinquished said, forcing her Feather into her domain away from his victory.

Alone out here, without his carpet of machines to carry him around, he seemed far smaller. But he recovered with lightning fast movement, scrambling back on his feet, turning his near stumble into a deep bow. “O’ hallowed mother!” He said with glee, “Were you watching? It has been decades, no, centuries since I was last summoned before you. Have I proven worthy? Were you entertained?!”

Relinquished offered her a faint smile. “It was… entertaining enough.”

The Feather basked in the glow of recognition, elation stretched across his perfect features.

“I have a new task for you and your flock.” She said, waving a hand. “It seems two more Deathless have found their way within the heart of your strata while you were away.”

Joy was immediately replaced with rage. “They what?”

Relinquished held a hand up. And on the other hand, an image of To’Wrathh appeared. “And the news does not quite end there. For you see, this one here has tragically fallen in love with a human.” Relinquished said, sighing.

“In… love with a human?” To’Naviris seemed disgusted with that word. “Hallowed Mother, do you wish for an audience to witness you crush this wayward sister of ours? I would happily volunteer.”

Relinquished laughed, “Wouldn’t that be simply too easy my dear To’Naviris? Too light of a punishment? No, entertainment must be nurtured, kindled into a fire and then extinguished at its peak. I will allow you the honor of killing her yourself. After all, matters between Feathers should remain between Feathers.”

The Feather smiled widely at that. “I hear and will serve. As always, I am your faithful instrument.”

Relinquished gave the Feather a small wave, opening up her reports from that strata. The data was scarce as To’Naviris had drawn out all her eyes to follow after his ten toys. “To’Wrathh is attempting to rescue the human from another of my Feathers, one named To’Orda who is in the area.” She wove the story together. “Poor little To’Orda has long ago lost my favor, perhaps you can be the light he needs to rekindle his purpose. You will connect and work together to eliminate the Deathless in the strata, as well as my lost deluded child. You have my authority to take command of him from whomever he currently serves.”

To’Naviris shook with excitement, “Of course hallowed mother, I shall lead like a shepherd, and see to it your instruments are put to their rightful place. One to be restored, and the other cast down. Then, I will see the Deathless break themselves upon my feet.”

“Ah, but you seem to forget a detail, my child. To see true despair, is it not better to see the one she loves killed before her eyes first? Perhaps your order of operation requires some adjustments.”

The Feather looked horrified for a moment. “How had I not considered that? How?!” He seemed genuinely upset, hand going right to this mouth to chew off his nails. “Yes, yes! I will do exactly that, I will hunt down the object of her affections, and have his skin flayed off and stretched out alive so that she might see him one final time - and then I will cut her head off and present it to your altar for judgement!”

Relinquished hummed, “See to it then, I await a good show.”

A wave of her hand and the Feather was dismissed. She could see in her side windows as the Feather picked himself off the floor and jumped to action, ignoring the dead Deathless around him, racing out of this domain to return home.

To’Orda would surely not be surprised she’d kept track of where he’d gone. The cockroach in the darkness might very well be terrified of it, but at this juncture he was unneeded. Perhaps she will force him to fight Keith one on one soon enough, if the human survives what was coming next.

For now, two against two was a good enough match. She didn’t need to summon To’Orda here, or cared to speak to the dead husk that nearly betrayed her once.

He was already on the mission to kill the human, as per his leader’s true motives.

Would To’Naviris and To’Orda truly kill Keith? While not perfectly optimal, there was still a direction forward for her ultimate plans without the boy. Besides, stakes were needed. A bit of uncertainty on some sections of her plan were required by her directives. Better to have that uncertainty used up where it wouldn’t matter all too much for her overall goals.

With her audience done, she turned to her next target. The little To’Wrathh herself. She was still on a rapid approach to the strata her Winterscar ran around in, the situation hadn’t changed since the last time Relinquished had spied on her favorite Feather.

She drew on Unity and demanded an audience. The result was instant, no matter where the wily Feather flew through.

“My darling daughter.” Relinquished said, voice warm as she watched her wayward Feather materialize into her sanctum.

To’Wrathh gracefully dropped down on one knee, wings folding up around her waist. “Mother. You have requested my appearance? Is there news about the plan I need to be aware of?”

“Ever so quick to the point, I do appreciate that in my tools.” Relinquished hummed in satisfaction. “It seems To’Naviris has somehow discovered your little Winterscar’s location. And he is on his way to hunt and kill the pest before you get to him. Even going so far as to wrap To’Orda into his schemes. How unfortunate for your plans.”

To’Wrathh licked her lips nervously. “Yes, Mother. I assume if you are alerting me of this, you do not intend to request they withdraw or ease up?”

“And why would I do that? Would that not… ruin the fun?” Relinquished leaned into her throne, watching the nervous Feather before her squirm. “If I told him the plan, why To’Naviris would certainly ruin it by incompetence. Some of my tools simply… cannot keep their secrets. No, you are to make your way there and fight them off yourself. It will be more authentic to the fight if the stakes are true.”

To’Wrathh remained still and unmoving. “Of course Mother. However, while I appreciate my siblings assisting my plans by making a dramatic production of attacking the Deathless, is this not going too far? I cannot defeat two Feathers at once. And if I do the Winterscar will surely consider it suspicious. This is detrimental to my plan. I would like to request assistance of some kind to balance the odds, it would only be fair.”

Relinquished raised an eyebrow from her throne, then flicked a finger forward. To’Wrathh was sent flying off, slamming into an invisible wall. The goddess made sure the pain could be felt. No turning any of that off. “My little child,” She said, standing from her seat, her heel crushing down on the Feather’s soul back in reality. “I do not care if things are fair or not. I only care to be entertained. Am I understood?”

To’Wrathh slowly got back on her feet, standing up. “Of course mother.” She simply said, head bowed.

“I am so glad you can see reason. Convince whoever you need to convince, make your bargains as you wish, show me some of your prized resourceful initiative. I find that interesting enough, you have my permission to fight and eliminate both of my Feathers if need be. Neither of them have my favor. If the Winterscar witnessed a Feather going rogue and killing other Feathers to protect him… impossible to imagine, wouldn’t you say? Such a thing has never happened in our history.”

To’Wrathh stayed silent, head bowed.

Relinquished smiled, “All that is required is that you seduce the Winterscar in the end. You are dismissed.”

The Feather vanished, leaving the domain empty. The pale goddess slowly sat back down and folded one leg over another, then propped up her head with one hand, the other idly twirling a new chess piece in her hand. “Go on, my little dagger in the night.

Go do what you were meant to do.”