Ancient Alien Ruins or Pyramids of Janaidar
The island continent of Aryavartha holds many secrets, one of which are the pyramids in the central reaches of the island continent where no one goes.
This scene belongs to the planed sequel of the trilogy. It depicts Elijah, the stolen-man, and HuoJi when they journey to the center of Aryavartha, the island continent upon which the trilogy takes place. No one had visited the ancient-alien NuliZhu Pyramids since time immemorial. These are analog to the pyramids of Giza here on Earth.
This art piece and illustration may become cover art for one of the books.
Robert says: Not all of Vic’s art has a story behind it yet. While I was composing the rhetoric, she created her art according to her own muses. I love it!
NuliZhu Slavers Attack a Coastal Town of Aryavartha
Shocked silence fell when they topped the hill.
A gigantic flying-saucer hove into sight from the south, slowed, and took up station-keeping over the concentric, open-air promenades of the bucolic, early-industrial riverfront. Made of gold-embossed-silver with huge, complex techno-glyphs around the entire girth of the central globe, the spacecraft hummed audibly even at this distance.
Appalled, Alahna exploded in anger, “I knew it! I told the damnable eejits! The NuliZhu are upon us! Nothing will be left but old bogiturs and little children!”
The huge battle-saucer began spitting green spheres about the size of small acorn squashes into the burg. When the poison-gas-grenades hit, thick, billowing, greenish smoke spewed forth without explosion. The bustling village got systematically inundated. Heavier than air, it spread among the buildings while creating chaos amongst the running and screaming townsfolk. The poison cloud rapidly spread all the way from the central pentagon to the outer circles at the edge of town, and even along the wharves and docks on this side of the river.
In a panic, Eli and Alahna galloped back down the hill in the direction they came. Alahna spied a stand of oaks scattered among another mound of house-sized boulders, and they dismounted. Hopping off her enormous stallion AliFahl, she mind-spoke to him, Ye must all stay hidden. Monsters-most-malevolent attack Bahndahn Towne. I must go and see what I can. I would have thee and thy mare and foal safe.
AliFahl nickered in agreement, nodded his head, and the faithful mounts went to wait nervously between house-sized boulders.
Alahna and Eli hiked back up the side of the big hill and found a smaller grouping of boulders to hide between and watch. Alahna spoke with bitterness, “It is a Taking! It is the NuliZhu returned. Just as I thought all along! Just as I tried to tell them!”
As they watched, the giant spacecraft hummed across the river and bombed the other side of town. Soon, ugly green clouds entrained both sides of the river. A good number of villagers appeared to be dead in heavier areas of gas cloud concentration. In areas of less concentration, other people screamed and ran about in dire panic. Animals bolted and jumped fences. Chaos ensued. Wherever people or animals encountered the poison cloud—they simply fell. If running, they careened to the ground jerking and flopping till their bodies skidded and rolled to a halt.
Eli stood numb with shock, “It’s poison-gas or some sort of paralyzing agent!”
Alahna asked, “Gas? Agent?”
“Yeah! In my world we’ve had global wars and brushfire wars forever. One of the most hideous weapons of war is poison gas, which can be lethal or non-lethal.
His alien terminology confused her, “Lethal? Non-lethal?”
“Lethal means it kills you. Non-lethal means it doesn’t kill you, just makes you wish you were dead. That is, of course, unless it actually does kill you.”
Alahna cried, “I’ve got to go help them!” She started to singing a SijanPao.
Eli jumped up and put his hand over her mouth to pull her down. “Don’t do it! You’ll just get yourself killed—and if you die—I die. Worse, you’ll tip them off that somebody on Janaidar has the wherewithal to resist. According to the histories YuLong gave to me, that’s a destroyer-class combat spacecraft with beam-weapon emplacements.”
Momentarily releasing her anger, she knitted her brows.
To clarify, he said, “Cannons-of-light that would fry your little sphere-of-power and your pretty ass right along with it . . erm . . . as far as I know, because you people yourselves don’t know. The Guardians never taught you. Your spheres-of-power–your Paos–are weapons of war.”
She looked at him, “Paos as weapons?”
“Yeah . . . although I don’t really know what you’ve been taught. I do know the Paos are weapons of war.”
Looking back at the helpless and dying villagers—and all the pitiful and struggling creatures—Alahna wrung her hands and cried, “But I must do something!”
“Yeah . . . survive! This attack looks an awful lot like out-and-out warfare.”
Ship’s Lord Amenakh, an Anubisen War Bred
Ship’s Lord Amenakh is a disgraced, war-bred Anubisen of the NuliZhu Expeditionary Forces placed in charge of the Ophois Asenath Battle Cruiser.
In the CIC-1, Lord Amenakh overheard and made mental note to summon Sitkamose, also an Anubisen, when she was off-duty to break words with her. It bothered him to have a Tier-1 Subcaste Anubisen serving beneath a Tier-2 Subcaste Sekhmeten. Since the communiqué came to the active CIC, and directly from her versus her sekhmeten duty-chief, Amenakh knew she’d been stepped on by the narrow-minded blowhard whose laziness and brutish reputation were well known by all.
Lord Amenakh also knew she had risked her life, a risk she accepted when she bypassed the blowhard, a risk she might be required to stand accountable for if the blowhard discovered her gambit. The most interesting fact, and what got his attention, was the region of her console that had mysteriously come to life, which had never once been active since the spacecraft-carrier was commissioned some five millennia previous—more than 5,000 years. This is more than simple anomaly.