Tale of the Week 297: Troy - VOTING THREAD
Troy
Blick auf das brennende Troja (View of Troy burning) by J G Trautmann (from Wikimedia Commons)
You have ONE vote.
Submission 1 The fire raged inside. Oh, how it burned so very sweet. Burning, ready to turn everything to ash. Who cared about the consequences? No one could defend against it. The faint smell of filthy smoke started to rise, and with it came the echoing screams. Soaring through the sky, reaching out into an empty void, clamouring for an escape. But there was none. They had betrayed her, and the flame she felt inside. Or had she betrayed them? It was of no matter now. Those she loved were dead. Those who loved her had lost that love long ago. The fire was the only thing she felt now. Filling her completely. Coursing through her veins. So very sweet.
She paid no attention to the hands reaching out for her. She paid no attention to the crying, to those sobbing at her feet. White robes turned black and black eyes turned white. Slowly, she kept moving, fire radiating from her soul. The screams had stopped. The noise of burning timber seemed but a distant memory. And so, she came upon the altar. Her lungs filled with air, air filled with ash and fire and death. It had all come to this. No more. Her fire was fueled by all those who had done this to her. And so, she broke the fourth seal. It seemed so anticlimactic. The fire just stopped. She felt nothing. She heard nothing. The blaze that just a moment ago threatened to engulf the chapter house had vanished. Only charred wood remained. Charred wood and death. She could not understand. The pain wasn’t there, only emptiness. Could she not have salvation? She laughed for the first time, a shrilling, deafening laughter full of pure emotion. Finally, she turned, and behold, an ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him.
Submission 2 Garbed in the panoply of war, Hector the Shining Helm, mightiest son of King Priam stood upon the walls of the fair city of Ilios, gazing across Aegean.
"Brother, what have you done? You have risked the safety of our people!” Hector spoke sternly, hands clasped behind his back.
“What would you have me do?” A voice came “return her to Sparta to face the rage of the sons of Atreus?” Paris fairest of Priam’s heirs stepped forward, gilded crown atop his brow
“Aye brother I know full well the wrath of the Atreidai. To whether it again, she must return to the Archeans”
“I will go with her then!” Paris pounded his chest fire in his eyes “I will fight!”
“You? Fight?” Hector chuckled bitterly “pray tell brother, who’s horse would you ride to face the armies of Sparta? Who’s shield would defend you from Mycenean spears? What do you know of war?” Paris’ fire faltered against his brother's ire “you would sacrifice all our father has achieved in the name of peace for what? Boyish affections?”
“I love her!” Paris cried
“She returns to Sparta”
“Then you would condemn me to my death?” Came another voice, a woman.
“Nay, girl you damned your soul to Hades the moment you stepped foot on Troad soil” Hector hissed, looking towards the watchtower arch from whence the voice came.
“I am no girl Hector son of Priam King. You speak to a queen!” Hellen, Queen of Sparta, fairest woman in all the world, revealed herself. Her beauty matched only by the divine her pale complexion near silver in the bright moonlight, her hair a vibrant gold.
“Queen?!” Exclaimed Hector “I see no queen here; I see an ungrateful wife!” Hellen approached Hector, her gaze ablaze and struck his cheek with open palm “You dare...” Hector made to return the blow but was met with pointed finger and beautiful rage.
“You know not what I suffered in the court of the Atreidai, the humiliation, the degradation...” Hellen cried
“You would have me sacrifice the lives of my people, see my homeland burned to the ground for an unhappy marriage?” Hector nursed his reddened cheek
“Ilios is my home now! I would sooner die atop these walls defending it with sword in hand then return to Sparta!”
Hector made to retort yet his eyes shifted to the now clasped hands of the couple before him. He turned and breathed and for a long moment he gazed out to sea.
“Menelaus, he will come for you.” Hector spoke at last
“I know”
“...and the Myceneans will follow him”
“I know”
“There will be no escape”
“I know.”
“Then call Ilios your home then”
“Brother, I will fight” Paris declared once again
“Go, both of you. There will be plenty of fighting ahead of us. This I guarantee. For now, enjoy what time we have left.” Hector gazed out across the Agean and for a moment he swore he could see movement in the dark...
Submission 3 In the period of China’s First Solar Empire, out of all of the Great Ring of fortified space stations around the asteroid belt mining zone, Shanhai Station was the most formidable. The inscription above its main entry port read “First Pass Under Heaven”, in memory of an ancient fortress of the Great Wall on Earth.
No ship passing through its sector could escape the watchful eyes of Shanhai Station’s scanners and inspection drones. The station’s secondary gunnery systems were designed to intercept the incoming fire from three fleets attacking simultaneously. The station’s primary weapons were capable of opening the hull of a fully armoured fighter-carrier from bow to stern.
When Princess Yoshiko, daughter of the Japanese Emperor Go-Hanazono, visited Shanhai Station during difficult diplomatic negotiations, she attended a party in the station’s beautiful gardens to celebrate the successful end of the talks. She was enchanted by the sight of Li Hongji, son of the governor of Shanhai Station, riding a horse through the gardens. They talked for the rest of the evening and until the next morning. They quickly fell in love. When the Emperor’s delegation left the station, Yoshiko could not bear to be parted from Li Hongji.
After the Japanese Emperor’s flotilla left Shanhai Station, the absence of Princess Yoshiko was discovered. When the Jiju Bukan (the Emperor Go-Hanazono’s military aide) contacted the station, she learned that the Princes Yoshiko had married Li Hongji, without the Emperor’s permission. The rage of the Emperor Go-Hanazono burned brightly. When the governor of Shanhai Station refused to return Princess Yoshiko, the Emperor told his staff to plan an immediate attack on Shanhai Station, using the ships which had escorted his carrier to the station for the negotiations. However, the Jiju Bukan was a wise officer.
“Shanhai Station was designed to defend against exactly the kind of attack that we would be making,” she warned. “The Emperor’s forces must not fail in this opening battle, or we will be unable to assemble the allies we need to sustain a conflict with the First Solar Empire.”
“What do you propose, then?” asked one of the Emperor’s generals.
She continued, “Everyone knows that stations such as Shanhai consume water, despite the best recycling systems available, and they produce waste heat. Ships come and go constantly, bringing ice to the station. They are inspected with thermal scanners, to ensure that no-one is smuggled aboard, deep inside the many tons of ice. We could put a company of shock troops into sleep capsules and cool their bodies. They could wake up inside the station’s defences and neutralise them. We could enter the station with little resistance.”
“This is no solution!” said the general. “Everyone knows that sleep capsules produce heat, which would be easily detected by the scanners.”
“One of the Emperor’s scientists has modified our sleep capsules,” the Jiju Bukan said. “This will only last for a short time, but that is all we need.”
Reply With Quote
