Chapter 13: The Throne Room

Chapter XII

Mark

The fighting to get into the city was intense. It seemed like every few steps we encountered an Automaton, and if not for the Bellona Thorn (What Alex was calling her new weapon) we would have been destroyed. The thorn was apparently a gift from her father for fighting the good fight or something like that, we didn’t have much time to get the details. It could cut through this Caligulan Steel like a hot knife through butter, which made our lives a lot easier. We lost Jackie and Steve for a little bit, but they caught up with us after a few more intersections.

“Do we have any idea where we are going?” Steve asked once the four of us met up again.

“To the throne room,” I replied, seemed like an obvious place to start.

“Where is the throne room,” Jackie asked in annoyance.

“How am I supposed to know? I have never been to Olympus, I was following Alex.” I replied. Alex looked rested, and still glowed red.

“This city is not built like Olympus, so I have no idea where it is.” She said calmly. The calm was getting a bit annoying. Steve closed his eyes and muttered in Greek a little, then opened them and pointed.

“That way,” he said. It was better than what I was going to do (I was going to spin and go down the tunnel I would end up pointing) and we followed the path. We heard some roars from the tunnels to our left, but focused on the path ahead of us. We encountered a few more automatons, but they were easily taken care of. Then we found the entrance to the throne room. At least I assumed it was the entrance because of the giant dragon thing that was standing in front of it. I wish I brought Growlz, but he was hiding and didn’t want to come out.

We spread out, and Alex charged. I followed behind and to the left while Steve and Jackie attacked from afar. The head snapped at Alex, but it slammed into an invisible wall, just where her aura seemed to die off. She slashed and the scales dented on its nose. The dragon started swinging its head around in annoyance. I moved in and slashed upward on its stomach, but only made a shallow wound. Alex roared and charged in, mirroring my move with her weapon and deepened the cut. The Dragon roared in pain and black blood started gushing out of the wound. Alex and I jumped back.

A humongous crossbow bolt engulfed in purple fire slammed into the center of the cut Alex and I made and buried itself deep. The dragon made one last roar, then collapsed. As it melted away its teeth became four necklaces, apparently four trophies for us to keep. We put them on and turned towards the doors. I could tell that they had been damaged, beaten flat so whatever designs they had before were gone. Now they depicted a figure, most likely Caligula, doing feats that had been done by the Gods in the past - the chopping of Kronos into pieces with his scythe, wielding the Trident of Poseidon and Zeus’s lightning bolt, things like that. In disgust I pushed a door and it swung open without a sound.

The first thing I noticed about the room is it contained one throne instead of the thirteen it was supposed to. The one throne was a monstrosity though, the seat was human sized, and the frieze behind it reached all the way up to the ceiling (at least fifty feet up, if not more). The frieze showed various symbols that could be used to represent one Olympian or another, all pointing towards the person who was sitting on the throne. Caligula. To his left was a tall man wearing black combat fatigues and carrying a golden hammer. He was scowling at the apparent interruption. Caligula only smiled.

To his right was a Celestial Bronze net holding two figures, a boy and a girl. They were both struggling. As I saw those three my mind felt like was on fire as memories came rushing back to me. Sean and Anna were trapped in the net, and Brian DeFaux was free. He stepped forward in a guard position. He was helping Caligula. I started to get angry, but instead of controling me the anger only gave me energy.

“Hammer boy is mine,” Alex said as she started forward. I nodded, two children of the war God, just different aspects. I turned towards Steve and Jackie, then saw monsters beginning to spill out of side entrances to the room.

“Steve, free Sean and Anna, those two trapped in the net, they will help us. Jackie, provide cover and take out as many monsters as you can. Caligula is mine.” They nodded and we got to work.

Steve made a throwing motion and a purple saw flew out, hitting the top of the net and began to saw through. Jackie was firing bolts at monsters as fast as possible. Alex and Brian had begun to fight and the shock waves were destroying monsters near them. The monsters avoided me as I charged towards Claigula, switching Glacius from gladius to shield mode. Caligula swung downward with his sword and I turned my shield so that his blade would glance off of it. As the sword and shield made contact my arm went numb and the ground under me cracked and splintered.

The block, however, still worked. Caligula swung wide and I stabbed my blade into his chest. He laughed.

“You cannot kill me like that little boy.” Then he backhanded me and I landed next to where Jackie and Steve were working like crazy. I looked towards where the main battle was going on. Caligula was smugly waiting for me. Sean had joined Alex in fighting Brian, who was holding both of them off with surprising ease. Anna was making her way to Steve, Jackie, and I. When she reached us she smacked my head.

“Do you know how much you have worried us hammer boy? Let me see your arm.” She grabbed my numb arm before I could move it and inspected it. She then reached into her medicine bag and rubbed something into my arm. I regained feeling pretty quickly.

“Now, do you know whats going on? And who are these people?” I gave her a quick rundown of the last five months - Caligula, second camp, Jason, the whole thing. She frowned, then looked at Jackie.

“So we’re what...sisters?” She asked.

“I guess so, but lets figure that out if we survive this.” Jackie responded as she fired bolt after bolt into the monster horde. Anna nodded, moved to stand next to her, opposite Steve, summoned her bow and got to work thinning the monsters. I stood and charged again at Caligula.

Chapter 14