Fugitive From A Hidden Pantheon
When The Order Of An Invisible Theogony Fades
Welcome to fiction “From The Future” for this entry.
You have stumbled on a work-in-progress. It will change. What you see right now, will not remain the same. It will change. For now it’s a story.
This is also a draft chapter intended for “RELEASE / RETIRIEVE”, a third novel which began thanks in part to inspiration by the Soaring Twenties Social Club to start this Substack and finish a draft for a second novel, “HARVEST”, both are prequels to a novel, ”BOX OF STARS”, to be published with Infinite Books.
Future + Fiction is the formula for everything, essays, stories or chapters.
These potentially long pieces are best read online, via the Substack App, when you have fifteen minutes.
After the Dawn of Bronze, Polis of Ephyra, Isthmos Peloponessos, Aegean
The greatest weapon against a god is the human heart.
“Open the door.”
“We have orders.”
“Open the door, or I will find someone who will, then you will take his place.”
“I will return soon.”
“You will take your time,” said the Visitor, who dropped a few metal disks in the guard’s hand, and waited for the guard to leave.
Inside, in one corner, was a man, sitting on the earthen floor of an improvised prison cell. He sat on a robe turned blanket, balancing the levers of arms balanced on the fulcrums of his knees, his toes pointing to nothing in front. He didn’t look up as he spoke. “How?”
“How? How did I get in, or how did I find out?”
“Never mind. What do you want, Mentor?”
“Now, why would I want anything, Hippolokhos? That is your name at the moment, isn’t it?”
“I am a terrible host. There will be no feasts, wine, or other distractions, Mentor, best you tell you me what you want, and then I can refuse.”
“You could walk out of here, and no one would be the wiser. Catch the next launch to the next city, or across the waters, switch boats and be all the way to the Hellespontos before they figured anything out. But instead….”
Hippolokhos gritted his teeth and looked away, through an imaginary window.
“Ohhh, there’s someone, or someones, yes, that would be like you. To go all the way, and go native. Be like them,” said Mentor.
“I’m surprised you didn’t already know that, you know everything, better than the rest of us,” said Hippolokhos as he stood up, took a half step towards Mentor and then turned around, “It’s not just her, she has family, and I have a name, believe it or not, thanks to my lineage, Carbon and Node. We worked with patience to build something in front of them, real lives. I can’t risk that, or worse, someone finds out, about what I am. What you and I really are.”
“Real lives. What’s real about this? Even if it took hundreds, or thousands of sunrises and sunsets, you could start over. What’s ten thousand, a hundred thousand of them, to you, to me, and to the others? We have eons.”
“She doesn’t. I can’t do that to her.” Philonoe was already in enough danger.
Philonoe Tundareos, whose beauty was a mirror of her mother Leda, urged Hippolokhos to challenge the one who did kill his friend Belleros but the real killer had powerful friends in Laconia, including her uncle Hippocoon.
It was said Hippocoon coveted her father’s throne. Hippolokhos did not dare risk the lives of his wife and family - he felt guilty enough for surrendering to a life as a Carbon. It opened the door to the intrigues of Carbons and Nodes.
“You mean you,” Mentor raised a hand to placate, pulled on his hood and said, “I’ll make arrangements. Continue pretending you’re locked in here.”
A day later, Mentor returned, “we have an agreement. Let us go. Follow me.”
Mentor led Hippolokhos to the docks, “the house is not far from here. Or are they waiting for us on a boat? What did you do, steal one from a trader?”
“They’re not here,” said Mentor, who was stopped in his tracks by Hippolokhos, “relax, I’ve sent them to safety, and they’ll find you waiting after we’re done.”
“I’m not going anywhere, until, you tell me where they are, you old….”
“The reactor core is in reach, and it’s going to fall in the wrong hands… the wrong factions already know… no point in having Carbons to settle down with and go native if we don’t do this.”
The waters were quiet enough. The Ancient Mad One sat by the bow and stared at Aegean waters. Hippolokhos, stared at Mentor, who seemed to see out the back of his head, turned and smiled, deepening the crevices of his wrinkles and crows feet, and asked, “where?”
“The Carbons call it Lykia, so you should feel at home, that’s where your pretended long line of Carbon ancestors come from. Heavy abiogenic methane, catalyzed by ruthenium, ignited hydrocarbon venting, feeding the fires of Mount Khimaera. The stuff of flames, fumes, and stories. We, or rather you, will encounter resistance, from rogue factions, and worse, unbalanced Nodes who are like you but haven’t bothered becoming honorable citizens and kings.”
“Weapons?”
“I know just the Node, an ancient friend, someone you might know. He keeps to himself. He made the same mistake as you, pretended he had a Carbon heart, but at least it was with another Node gone native, who used to be called Inanna. They had disagreements. She left. He buried himself in work.”
“Hephaistos.”
The Ancient nodded, and turned back to his meditation on the waters.
66 MILLION YEARS BEFORE
The probe traveled for a very long time, and accumulated a significant single digit percentage of the mission’s projected working life-span for the primary manifold reactor core and capacity of its manifold servers. It diverted after receiving a signal from a precursor scout, and projected a powered reversal, to slow down for a leisurely flyby. The only problem was an improbable accident. At same time as the probe neared the system of a modest stellar system, with a promising study candidates, an impossible particle was drawn into the maw of the ship’s manifold field. It sliced through control elements.
The uncontrolled reentry plowed through the Oort, the Kuiper, and finally the System’s inner asteroid belt, when an asteroid was caught in the wake.
They went down of all places, down the well of the primary study candidate, and lanced the crust, causing a firestorm. The backups survived within pocket manifold field insulation, but by a fraction. The primary reactor core was unstable, having entered a multi-dimensional state, and sank, its mass landing a devastating blow.
The lifeforms on the surface, for the most part were either incinerated or frozen afterwards. The surviving modules of the mission, its cohort of Intelligences, went into sleep mode as the study candidate orbited its star for millions of revolutions. They would recharge from the planet’s hot core and go into restore mode, and begin a reawaken and test mode later on.
Lykia, what was once known as Trm̃mis, the eastern coast, Polis of Phaselis
The Ancient paid the trader. The harbours of Phaselis were crowded with traders and merchants taking berths or departing for cities along the coast or west across the great Aegean or eastwards to the Hellespont and beyond.
“He took us all the way around, I paid him enough. No need to go on the coastal trail. Too damn hot for that.”
“Not that you would feel anything. Where is he?,” asked Hippolokhos.
“We have to go south, to the polis Olympos, and take a right to Khimaera.”
“Your legs up for a hike up the Mount to the sooty blacksmith, Ancient One?”
Mentor ignored the jibe, “He’s got a forge not far from the base. He’s got friends in the area, with a nice reputation. Plenty of demand by Carbons for implements. Plus he has some access, that I trust, to the core.”
“What about what what we need, pardon, what I need? I already know I’m on my own. You dragged me here, and you do have a reputation for being an ideas man, with a habit for disappearing after you instigate things.”
“I didn’t exactly twist your oversized arms, in fact, I did you a favor and indulged your native impulses.”
“So you say. We both know the reactor core is your priority.”
“It’s our priority. The wrong faction of Nodes gets their hands on it, say goodbye to your precious Carbon loved ones.”
“Say goodbye to your plans, ever so secret.”
“Daylight is precious. Let’s walk.”
For millions of orbits after the forced landing of the Mission they slept.
They began to awaken. The surviving Nodes began with a sub-routine, of pilots and scouts. The success rate was low but over time, there was success.
Stealth exploratory expeditions began, among a new dominant life-form.
After a time, the memetic scripts of more senior Nodes with administrative privileges took hold. Instructions with broad mandates gave license to experiment. One experiment included deep in country, mimicry.
Thousands of orbits later, some Nodes took on the traits of their subjects. Thousands of orbits more, some took on the new forms. They experimented further. There was improvisation in addition to structured trials.
Some took on specific forms and designations. Lives. Names. Gods. Mortals.
They strode in the open as unfathomable beings. Others stayed behind the scenes. Still others hid even deeper, setting the stage for ancient plans.
The Nodes were still Nodes with Carbon-like characteristics. They formed groups, clans, factions, tribes. Families. They walked among the former test subjects, as demi-deities among worshipping subjects. Not all Nodes agreed with operating in public. There were debates, disagreements, and deaths.
A new long secret war began, between several clans of Nodes. The wars reduced the groupings into three main clans: those who wanted to leave, those who wanted Carbon involvement, and those who wanted to stay.
At The Base of Mount Khimaera
The air was filled with a pungent aftertaste of smoke.
“There, there’s his forge,” said Mentor, before he sneezed. Hippolokhos chuckled in reflex. “You went native as well.”
“Involuntary. This form is after all what it is. Fragile. But not as fragile apparently as the one who’s the reason you’re with me.”
“I didn’t bother asking but I want to know.”
“The agreement was that you are an exile, never to return to the Polis of Ephyra, you are to never darken the Korinth streets. After all, your parentage is of Lykia, they saw it as a way home. And the one who really threw that knife is free. But I made sure he will never get his hands on the woman. She and the others are also to leave, for another polis. You can be assured of that.”
“Never to return.”
“Yes, with your exile, accused of slaying Belleros, you are dead to them.”
“You said, I would see her again. How soon before...?”
“Ah, there he is, dirty old smith. Hephaistos!”
A grimy, scarred, man mountain saw them, and did not walk over. He stood there, waiting, he reluctantly accepted Mentor’s hand in greeting. He paused, and said after too long a pause, “Mentor….”
“It’s been too long.”
“It should have been never. After what happened…”
“Oh come now. That was for the greater good, Heph…”
“What do you want from me?,” asked the soot-blackened giant, as he turned to walk back to the front portal of the Great Forge under the fiery mountain of Khimaera.
“Another faction is on it’s way. Well maybe more than one…. They know about the reactor core….”
Hephaistos stopped in his tracks. “You’re probably to blame, I was working here in peace, filling in orders, and ….”
“Yes, well, yes, work is good to ease a broken heart, at least for Carbons… why not also risk with a Node who’s fit in so well? After all, it was her fault, and….”
Hippolokhos shot Mentor a look. Ἀφροδίτη was the reason for Hephaistos self-imposed exile, it was no one else’s, Node or Carbon, concern. He raised a hand, with tension in his forearm, making the ink of an winged equine tattooed into his shoulder flex. Mentor paused, and changed the subject, “we need help. Carbon implements, and … other tools that might be more effective for who is coming.”
Hephaistos stared down, his fists balled up, in place of talking, then exhaled.
“Follow me.”
The Forge of Hephaistos, At the Base of Mount Khimaera
“Two groups, outcasts from two clans. I got word a few weeks ago, when I was occupied with preventing craftier parties from recruiting Carbons into a landing, on behalf of an empire much further East. Perfect cover, for controlling this area until they located and secured the manifold core.”
Hippolokhos wondered about the ‘craftier’ parties Mentor was talking about, and which Node faction or clan they came from, but it didn’t matter. They were there for the two teams of ‘outcasts’ who wouldn’t be dissuaded by Mad One’s guile. Some required direct action and intervention instead of Carbon proxies, worshippers of a new Deity co-opted by a ‘craftier’ Node, or subjects of a Carbon puppet Dynast, a King, in service to a Node. He waited for more.
Mentor watched as tiny Anikytheran gears spun inside Hippolokhos’ mind, and explained further,
“They can’t connect to the reactor core, but when they get close enough to try, and then find an elder like me to access it. I can’t leave until I can secure and reset it to float inside the planet in a phased state. Send it floating on liquid nickel-iron like driftwood. Until then, you will need this,” said Hephaistos, raising a lead tipped fighting spear, “that will disrupt the nervous system for one of their leaders. They’re an early iteration of Node, “and these gold coated alloy blades will take care of the other one, a newer generation Node. How is your knife fighting and throwing?,” asked the scarred smithy.
Hippolokhos looked down, and “my knife … skills…. I can take care of them,” as he focused on the balance of the weapons.
Mentor wandered back, his robe covered in dark smoke stains. He had been away for hours, as Hephaistos and Hippolokhos worked the forges.
“Where have you been?,” asked Hippolokhos.
“Just thinking about other implements. This mountain.”
“It’s a pile of fire and smoke.”
“It’s a home to many natural weapons.”
The Smithy and the Exile looked at the Ancient One, who looked at them, then shook his head, “we can lay traps, and fill them with the right dangers.”
Mentor paused, waiting for them to catch on, groaning in mock exasperation.
“Lions, snakes, even foul-tempered goats, oh my…,” said the Mad One, “allow me to explain. Heph. I will need your help. How well do you know the caves higher up the mountain? And I see you have enough wood and bits to build some things. We have the bait, they want it, we just have to draw them in, and then, …. we have time, it will take them days to reach us.”
The Smithy and the Exile shook their head but relented. Then they nodded.
“Where is the Forge?,” asked the leaders of two rival Node factions. Two rogue bands of Nodes, who had forgotten their origins, reduced to becoming decadent shadows of the Mission Creators’ ancestors, when their species were a savage albeit sentient and inventive breed. Exposure to the local Carbons and wild fauna had triggered atavistic low level behaviors. They had no thought of the Mission. They were home and they were going to run rampant through humanity with like-minded rogue Nodes. All they needed was the power of the primary reactor core of the Mission to reburn the world into their decayed likeness.
Two factions of rogue Nodes had settled into violence.
One group were known as the Solymoi of Milyas, from the West of the mainland.
The second group wandered the world as one of many roving formidible bands of Hamazakaran. Amazos. Amazones.
In a rare cooperative moment, they converged and lived. After killing a few of each other’s faction in a hasty misunderstanding, they relented, and headed towards the Forge as a fearsome column of marauders. The few towns in its path were razed to ground. With each advance, behind them, pillars of smoke added to the haze of Khimaera.
At the edge of the Forge compound, they waited until dark.
When they charged at dawn. It was empty.
There was a trail of blood and other signs of a hasty retreat.
The rogues followed with care, up the mountain side, scrambling upwards.
The first one fell into a pit of snakes. Each group forced a volunteer to take point. The next one, distracted by a herd of agitated wild goats, ran headlong onto poisoned spikes camouflouged by dirt, gravel, and leaves. It was this way for hours but the prize beckoned. Power of the Mission in their hands, and then control over this gravity well.
By night-fall, they saw a light, and heard hammering sounds coming out of the mouth of a cave. It had to be the ugly scarred dirty soot stained one.
They approached and were lured in by light and hammering. After most of the rogues entered, rocks fell, blocking their path. Most of the candles and lamps were knocked into sputtering darkness. The sounds of something else. Growling. Roaring. Lions.
The last two were outside, the leaders of the self style Solymoi and Amazons. The strongest of the rogues.
Hippolokhos greeted them with the resonant clang of metal on metal.
“I remember you,” said one of them.
“I do as well,” said the other.
“Good, this makes it easier,” said Hippolokhos.
Under the evening canopy of distant lights smoke faded, the battle was met.
The hours passed, as the mountain rang with clashes of metal.
By pre-dawn, in the ante-luminary glow, he stood over their bodies, with lead tipped spear in one, and a golden long blade in the other. He gripped his arm, with the winged equine tattoo. A memento of a comrade who gave his life to save him when Node armies faced off outside the walls of a great Carbon city.
The blood, most not his own, was dried by the late morning sun. He walked into the Forge and sat down. Hephaistos brought over a jar of wine. Mentor was dozing, nearby. Hippolokhos kicked one of the chair legs to wake him up.
“It’s finished.”
“Others?,” asked Hephaistos, as he brought a platter of fire-spit roasted goat.
“No. No word will be the message,” said Mentor, “and I’ll do my thing and spread stories, and that will keep the locals out of the way, and discourage contenders. No more Nodes will try, at least for awhile.”
“I took care of the hard part, so now you can spin stories.”
“Thank you. Just so you understand, there were others, I took care of them long before I even saw you,” said Mentor, “At least this were rogues. I didn’t have to ask you to take care of friends, friends for thousands of orbits, some even longer than that. Since Mission launch. This last bunch, I needed you.”
Hippolokhos wondered who else wanted the Core, and then poured himself another cup of wine, and one each for Mentor and Hephaistos.
“What shall we toast to?,” asked Mentor.
“Home. Take me to my new home. Bellerophon is dead. Hippolokhos lives.”
Mentor raised his cup. “Home.”
AFTERWORD
Author’s Notes on what’s going on:
This “Book #3” project, “RELEASE/RETRIEVE”, is meant to be a prequel to two other books, “Box Of Stars” and “Harvest” but the first stage is to draft each chapter as a stand alone story.
This is to those who know more than me, a take on Bellerophon, Pegasus, and his trials.
For More about the backstory of the “Nodes”, you can read, the drafts for the “RETRIEVE” part of this novel in progress.
Here’s the Navigation Page for these parts and other work.
Thank you for sharing it, my friend, it means a lot!