Kings of Hell

Ariel’s POV

I have never slept so deeply. I was living the life of a real sex goddess. All my desires were met, plus some. Every day. Every night.

Finally, after who knows how long of sexual adventures, I awaken refreshed. Usually I was woken by a Zenith eating me out. Oh, yeah, it was a nice fucking life.

And! I look around. Huh. Where is everyone?

“Wade,” I yawn as I roll out of bed and then pick up a robe, wrapping it around me as I skip my way out of the bedroom of our new house in FC. I walk around the empty place. I trot down the stairs and I walk to the front windows off the living area. Looking up, the green purple sky is perfectly neon, as the sun slowly rises, “Wade? Micha? Terror… Irvine?” I call out every name, wondering which Zenith Alpha’s are around here somewhere.

They never left me completely alone.

My voice echoes back at me.

My hairs stand on end in the empty, silent house.

Something isn’t right.

When I look out onto the street again – it’s… too… empty. Too quiet. Um –

As I’m staring outside, a line of armed Atlantis soldiers start marching by the window a second later, and I immediately pull back and hide against the wall.

I’m not alone.

I see someone in the arc way of the hallway, which leads to the front door.

The intruder is holding up a gun, aimed to my head.

Oh, shit!

He’s a young man – but clearly a genetically changed one. And he… he looks like my father? With dark brown eyes.

He’s tall like my Zenith’s, staring me down along the barrel of his gun.

“On your knees,” he asks of me – politely, “You have three seconds, three, two –” he’s too calm and rehearsed for me not to listen. My instincts say he’ll shoot if I don’t move.

In shock, I drop to my knees, just missing the before-part of when he finishes counting to “One.”

I watch his finger almost bend over that trigger, and he barely manages to stop himself.

He’s training was too precise.

Now that I’m on my knees, he lowers the gun and says, “Hands behind your head.”

I slowly do so.

“Who are you?” I ask, breathless.

I have no idea what is happening.

Why any of this is happening.

He doesn’t seem to want to answer.

But he’s just carefully taking into account what he should say, how much he could say.

After a while, he decides on what he can talk about.

“Freezing hell over,” he states calmly, and before I can ask what does that mean – he brings out a different gun, with a wider shot.

“W-Wait,” I beg him. His finger has half bent over the trigger. His eyes go from lining up the shot, then glancing at me briefly, “You don’t have to do that, no!” I scream as my words have no effect, and his finger bends again, but then stops with my screech.

He decides to speak, slightly irate, but still calm, “My name is Dale – in lieu of the greatest Ultimate. I’m the next generation, the KINGS guard. I’m sorry,” he gulps and aims again, “I’m sorry,” he whispers twice – then presses the trigger.

I know my eyes show extreme terror.

But there is nothing I can do.

Whatever hits me, blinds me, then freezes me solid in mere seconds.

Sally’s POV

The Zenith Alphas and A.R.M.Y were responding to a missile launch threat, so they and I, appeared at the tracking station, at the nearest police station.

It was an error.

To take them out.

I was lucky I pulled out at the last second, to grab an early morning coffee instead around the corner.

We knew it was most likely an error, but they were all on it. Soldiers to the core.

What happened next was a bit overwhelming.

Like a fever dream – soldiers starts to storm down the street in all directions. It was barely a new dawn, and no one was about.

It seemed too well rehearsed, but it was real.

An enormous Transpendiser was acting like a portal for armies of men to appear in the centre of FC – along with fucking tanks.

I casually walked backwards into the alleyway behind me.

And squatted behind a bin.

I was morbidly watching.

The Zeniths and A.R.M.Y are all hit with tranquilising drugs or reverse charges – all of our best men in battle are slow moving as they are quickly succumbing to whatever sound is also pulsing toward them. The air is vibrating in waves. A weapon of war is disorienting them all to the point they knock into one another and keep falling to their knees on the tar road.

I’m now literally behind a garbage can, watching them fall.

I put my coffee on the ground, trying not to throw up.

We’re under attack?

I’m terrified they’re about to be killed, so I can’t keep my eyes off the encroaching army.

But just as shockingly quick, as the Zenith Alphas and A.R.M.Y succumb to a more still position, upon their hands and knees and reduced to crawling – a wave of blinding white and ice pulses through the air and covers their bodies in seconds. Turned to ice.

Atlantis literally just fucked the best soldiers ever created in the entire world’s history, right up the ass, in under a solid minute.

They were down.

And my parents were supposedly in Atlantis right now.

Not. Good. Not good at all.

I continue to scoot back on my ass, the air around me feeling like it can cut me in two. It’s horrible, as the feeling of ice cold keeps pulsing toward me, then eventually subsides and disperses.

As it does so, the first line of soldiers standing around have their heads explode with gore – and I gasp. It’s a last ditch effort from York, who’s the last to freeze completely.

Aaron is frozen with a purple glow in his eye, which soon dissipates into the ice around him.

I turn around, my hiding spot in the alleyway not very hidden – when I turn into the legs of someone shadowing me.

I look up helplessly from my squat to see a young soldier, holding the same freeze gun over my head.

No. No!

He doesn’t give me a second to think straight.

To ask anything.

He presses the trigger for the ice to consume me – and I hear a roar down the alleyway from a familiar car, and from the driver’s window rolled down.

“NO!” I heard Casey yell?!

I see him. He is the last thing I see, my brother, too far away to save me.

Then my vision blanks.

My nerves stop firing. So does my innate lightning.

I’m firmly stuck in ice, unable to escape this prison.

Wendy’s POV

Yesterday, instead of showing me to fight for an incoming war, Casey showed me his video game collection in his old house, the bunker underground in FC. He acted way normal after that. I just went along with it, and I had a feeling he was deleting his devil behaviour from his brain while playing the Old World games.

Or maybe he just wanted me to experience being a kid a little longer, instead of making me grow up with yet more violence.

Then, eventually we returned to his house in the Club.

I slept like a baby all night, exhausted from being a spy.

And now it was the next morning.

I felt strangely at peace.

I’m dancing around the Club Mansion in the early morning. I told Casey I wanted to relax today. No work. He was gone somewhere, so I found some music, blasted it through the speakers and started my day by owning the whole place. Like a real home. By pretending to fight fake enemies in the air. Why not?

I could dance and fight at the same time! At least I try, leaping from couch to couch – spinning and punching and kicking the air.

Yeah, I feel like an idiot, but it’s fun.

I’m pretending to twirl on the kitchen counter, while throwing blunt cutlery in the air, treating them like throwing daggers, and fantasising Casey returning and being real angry.

It makes me smile – but then a fucking explosion rocks under my feet.

Shaking everything.

The rumble dies off, as I stop on my tiptoes.

Ooo… ah, wha –?

I jump down and sprint to the windows to see what the hell is going on.

I look down to see Casey pull his car out of the garage and race down the street –

A tank pursuits him. Dust flies up through the sky, and dirties the crystal clear glass. Did they shoot at the garage?

I watch as the New World tank from Atlantis, rolls down the street – and shoots again at Casey’s car.

He drifts out of the way just in time, then disappears around into another street.

Was I dreaming?

I’m unable to process it.

So I turn on the television.

Um, okay, this invasion is real.

And bad.

“Everyone evacuate to the side walk – this is a peaceful evacuation. Anyone left behind, will be dead by the afternoon. We’re nuking the city at 8pm. I’m taking you all to the New Worlds,” Airen speaks passionately, “Not as slaves or beggars – we’re all going to live together equally. Move out. A New World awaits. This hell will be gone tonight – you’ll all be provided for under my governance. A true diplomacy –”

What.

So Dale really did bring the war right to us.

What the hell did they do for it to be this bad?

I make a call to Colonel Hubert.

Someone answers after six long rings.

“Hello?” A voice shakes.

“Is Hubert there? Who is this?”

“I’m his wife – who are you?”

“A work colleague. It’s top secret,” I whisper, dramatically.

“He’s dead,” the wife whispers, on the verge of tears, “Hubert is dead.”

“…I’m so sorry…” I whisper, shocked again, “Are you, okay?” Stupid question.

“Who am I speaking to?”

“My name is Wendy,” I tell her, feeling so stupid, “I’m just a kid, sorry, he knew something about my past, and –”

“Wendy?” the wife chokes back some tears, “Wendy, I know who you are. Hubert talked about you. You’re calling from Frank City?”

“Yes –”

“They’re coming to kill Ultimates,” she whispers, “Hide.”

She hangs up. An unexpected friend from Atlantis? Okay.

I stare at the phone, while I look out the window and I see a line of soldiers now storming the front of the Club. Just a random patrol.

The phone slips from my fingers. Fuck. I pick it back up and run.

Music still blasting around me, I head to the emergency exit.

The moment I’m down the fire escape and in the alley way off the side – my phone is ringing again.

It’s Casey!

As soon as I answer he’s screaming at me, “Are you out?”

“Yes.”

“Stay out. Where – where are you?” he’s raging.

“The exit, outside your club on the side, they’ve come to kill us,” I gulp down, “ULTRA failed to –”

“Stay there.”

Casey hangs up.

I stand stock still in the alleyway, in red pyjamas and white socks only. I stick out like a sore thumb, but all I can do is wait.

A minute later, a roar of an engine shows the car swinging into the alley, to pick me up.

Casey stops the car opposite and jumps out, reaching for my hand.

As he does so, the emergency exit behind me – opens up.

I scream, terrified, as I turn around.

“Kill yourselves,” Casey snarls it.

I watch as every soldier right in front of me, raises their guns under their chins before pulling the trigger.

A rain of blood flies up into the air.

Casey has twisted me toward him but I’ve already seen it.

He shoves me into the car, pushing me over the middle console as he gets into the drivers side and slams the door shut, while I lay curled up in the passenger seat.

“What the hell happened to our city?” I ask, trying to erase those brains exploding everywhere.

“This is a fast strike – they’re only coming for the Ultimates,” Casey speaks in a monotone, “They paid off the FC army. They’ve surrendered. They got Sally. I can’t get through to Ari – we’re going to her place next,” Casey can’t look at me as he pulls forward, eyes, still on the sky briefly.

I wonder if he’s praying.

I’m just too traumatised to even speak.

As we pull out into the road, I notice one of the tanks lets us drive by.

I don’t know why.

Casey pulls us around to his sister’s place.

The street is filling with citizens, now piling onto the sidewalks, with their hands up or with white towels in their hands as flags of surrender.

Everyone looks afraid.

However, they all have a look of hope on their faces as they see STR1KE, the car.

That look only half fades when Casey is the only one of STRIKE to exit.

I follow him, right behind.

Citizens ask him for some answers, he doesn’t hear them.

And they don’t come too close.

Casey walks through Ariel’s door – which has been left open an inch.

I follow right behind the whole time.

We turn into a living room, where gas floats over the carpet.

No… just… cold air – floating off an ice block.

With a woman inside.

Ariel.

She’s frozen by the window, eyes stuck in a look of complete terror, her hands behind her head.

Behind her – a group of young soldiers. Familiar faces.

Am I tripping?

They can’t be more than a year older than me, or perhaps even my own age.

“Dust,” the one in front calls to his second – who sends out a lightning bolt to hit Casey, before he can even open his mouth to defend himself.

Casey is stunned into a heavy heap that falls forward, quickly turning to ice.

He’s defeated already?

What do I do now?!

Soldiers come forward with three guns that freeze him over entirely, making sure there is no way he’ll break out.

I don’t think they expected to see me.

I’ve backed up into a wall, my hands up in front of my face – hoping to show I’m harmless.

“Who are you?” the one in charge asks me. The one that looks like Dale. It’s so fucking weird. He looks my age.

I’m too scared to even say my name.

“No one,” I barely manage to blurt a response.

“She’s someone,” Dust – the guy second in command, guesses correctly with a roll of his eyes to the first commander.

Why were they so young? What was happening?

“Take the blocks out,” the one in charge orders his three behind him.

They look… more innocent, somehow.

“My name is Dale,” the one in charge with brown eyes, and a familiar face, comes toward me, ushering me toward the kitchen somewhat kindly.

I walk with him a few steps and then stop, too scared to go to a room too isolated alone with a stranger.

He puts an arm around my shoulders and tries to comfort me.

“We’re changing the world,” he tells me, “You’re safe, I promise you. All citizens are being extradited to Atlantis. For a new life. You just need to join everyone on the roads outside. Alright?”

“You just froze my – f-friend,” I stutter. I pull out of his arm and turn to him, “Why do you look like Dale and have his name?” I ask, monotone, “Dale’s my boss.”

“Are you an Ultimate?” Dale asks me, his eyes suddenly narrowing.

I immediately shake my head.

“Just a 16 year old orphan,” I state, “Dale takes in orphans. Is Dale safe?”

“Those monsters are gone now, and we’re saving the world,” he tells me again, confused why I don’t understand that, “You need to go to the road.”

“Dale,” I address him, sticking out my hand, “My name is Wendy.”

He looks at it and tilts his head curiously.

Why was he acting like some kind of zoo animal?

Eventually, after a second, he lifts his head and his dark brown eyes snap up mine as he shakes my hand – swiftly.

“Wendy,” he repeats it, looking straight into my soul, “I’m the leader of the KINGS guard. I protect the New World.”

“Did you – did they experiment on you?” I whisper, scared, “Did they hurt you?”

Dale raises a very confused brow.

“What? No? The New World has never hurt me – and I’ve never been experimented on,” Dale tries not to laugh, “I’m just a trained soldier.”

“How old are you?”

“18,” Dale shrugs, “Come on, I’ll walk you to the road,” he really wants to follow orders.

I turn with him.

Him and his squad, they looked like STRIKE. But there were differences that made them look more human. Although the height and strength were the same. They didn’t look like experimented on freaks. No scars. Maybe even no leopard genes for this Dale.

His squad go out the back door with the ice blocks manoeuvred between them. We walk toward the front door, and Dale opens it, looking down the busy street. I glance out with him, he’s smiling toward some tank with a man, standing out the top.

“Father,” Dale murmurs under his breath, turning to me, “That’s Airen. My father.”

He sounds so proud.

We both look out again, and Dale puts a hand on my back, to usher me toward the road.

“FIRE.”

Airen screams an order.

Dale immediately puts his arm around my waist, and hauls me back into the house. Once I’m out of the way, he walks back forward and looks out.

As I hear a rain of bullets.

People scream for a second.

No longer.

It’s haunting.

I’m frozen solid.

Dale watches the massacre, then turns toward me.

“I don’t want to die,” I almost whimper it.

There is this broken look in his eye. I’m not sure he’s even heard what I said. This young strange Dale simply walks toward me, hand on my back, as he leads me toward the back door, head down.

I say nothing – all I know is I’m going with them.

Which means I’m alive.

That afternoon

“Airen has a soft spot for orphans,” they are Young Dale’s only other significant words to me, as I’m standing close to him at all times, after they’ve transported ice blocks of the Ultimates back to Airen in Atlantis.

We’re in a huge military base underground.

I just can’t even fathom my day.

I’m still in complete shock.

From what I had seen. Any FC citizen that looked relatively flawless, was brought back to Atlantis. I had heard it was the disfigured ones, or strange mutants, those with extra limbs and limps and strange features… it was they whom had been culled. Mercilessly.

But I knew it was way more. And random at that.

Maybe a hundred or two hundred had been spared. That was a generous thought.

I didn’t know how I was alive right now.

Now, after everything is complete in a day’s war, Dale has approached Airen – in front of the Atlantis army. This was their time to congratulate each other.

Airen embraces Dale, and they turn toward the ice blocks of STRIKE, Zenith’s Alphas, A.R.M.Y… even REIGN. All of them.

I can barely look at them on display like war trophies.

“Look,” Airen speaks, nostalgic, “See their features. They made them look like animals. You’re presentable. Human. Guardian of Atlantis. KINGS Guard. You’re a hero to us all, Dale,” Airen unhands his ‘son’ from a hug, and turns to him, happy with his silence, he goes onto say, “It’s time to nuke that hell they called a city,” Airen shakes his head, and passes Dale a small simple device. With a button to explode an entire city.

“Why?” the young solider asks, abruptly, “Just let it be now. No waste. Remember?”

“Dale,” Airen speaks slowly, “I love you like a son… that Dale over there, thought he owned that city. You’re saying you want it? Must be in your genes. Nuke it. If you want,” Airen winks, “I’ll let you decide.”

Dale and I watch Airen suddenly pace off.

Suspicious much?

Dale looks at me.

I shake my head.

Dale might have pressed it if I wasn’t there – but with my look, he’s reconsidered.

Airen has turned in his pacing, and comes back over.

“Why not?” Airen asks, a little disappointed. Or perhaps very disappointed, “Dale,” his tone changes completely. From light handed, to deep and bitter.

The young solider speaks from total innocence, “You killed them all, father. Weren’t we going to assimilate them? Why nuke an empty city. Let their dead bodies have a graveyard,” Dale tries to reason, comfortably.

Airen walks right up to Dale, until they’re nose to nose.

The rage simmering in Airen is just beneath the surface.

He turns from Dale and then spins to him again, torn between decisions.

Airen snatches the remote form Dale’s hands.

“A year’s isolation,” Airen snaps at the guards, “Seems a little light handed. Make it two years.”

“Father?” Dale asks, completely confused, still innocent to the violence in Airen, “F –”

“This is the first and last time you’ll ever disobey me!” Airen screams it.

I step back from the shock of it.

I see Dale’s innocent face pause.

Then reality registers.

He’s in trouble.

I watch a squad marche forward and they surround Dale to march him off.

He’s pulled away with no resistance. Like dragging a puppy.

Airen turns back to me.

“Who even are you?” he sneers.

Fuck.

“An orphan,” I whisper, “I’m no one.”

He believes it.

When I look across the floor, I see Dust and the two others watching on.

They’re looking at me like I’m the problem.

“If you’re an orphan – you’ll be sent to an orphanage,” Airen decides, briefly.

“Father,” Dust comes forward, “Dale did nothing wrong. He is loyal to you.”

“This girl distracted him,” another one of the squad comes forward, pointing toward me.

The entire Atlantis army watches on as Airen is faced with issues once again.

As Airen is berated by the KINGS guard – he’s own guard.

I watch his ego inflate with all eyes on him, as his back straightens and he turns to each one. Slowly.

“Two years isolation – is a fitting sentence for disobedience, a father’s word is law,” Airen’s mouth perks up in the corner, “Do you disagree?”

“The girl distracted him,” Dust repeats what they’re all thinking, “The girl –”

“You’re pinning his misguided step on being a virgin?” Airen asks, leaning over, trying not to laugh.

“No,” Dust snaps, “I was just saying that – father, please, please listen,” Dust’s tone rapidly changes to child-like, as a look of absolute violence crosses Airen’s face.

“Two years, isolation, for each one of you, until you’re real men,” Airen turns to the rest of the army nearby, “And black out the lights in each cell,” Airen calms down as the order is finalised and his soldiers come forward to apprehend his own guard.

Eventually Airen faces me again, reading the horror written plainly on my face, “They can take it. They can take a lot worse.”

I don’t dare disagree.

If that’s what he did to Ultimates.

I just nod.

“What is your name?” Airen asks, like he didn’t just act like a total fucking monster.

“Wendy,” I say it before I can think of another name.

But I do notice, that nothing registers in his eye. He, for whatever reason, doesn’t know me.

“I’ll send you to a good centre, with free education – until you’re 18,” Airen stops, “Two years,” he smiles at the irony.

Two years.

In a blacked-out room.

Because his young soldier didn’t nuke Frankincense City.

But neither does Airen. He hasn’t pressed the button.

He seems to have lost that fire to make it that final of a decision.

The soldier assigned to taking me away to some orphanage, leads me by the arm.

As I’m taken away, I look over my shoulder.

Airen thinks.

While holding the remote for the nuke.

Airen senses my hard look.

He glances up, and seems to realise my relief that he has not pressed the button.

Shit.

Airen’s old weathered hand trembles as he raises the remote.

What happened to this man? To make him so evil?

Airen’s thumb drops – and he nukes FC with half a smile.