After discovering the small, single-car high-speed trains in the hangar
below the Control Room, which was itself hidden below the Aroruan Palace,
Chancellor Elahte and the Ampron Force were faced with two difficulties.
The first was simply getting to the trains. They all agreed that there
had to be controls for the door leading to the hangar somewhere in the room,
but the room design was so ultra-high-tech that actually locating the
controls became difficult, since virtually every wall surface looked like a
control of some sort. Eventually, Dent noticed a large lever in the wall
next to the door. Curious, he pulled it into the “up” position, which
opened the door.
“D’oh,” commented Vasta.
“Figures,” added Dixon, smirking.
Once they had gotten past the door and walked down the steps to the
hangar, opening that door with another lever, they were faced with the
second difficulty: how to activate the trains. Surprisingly, it was Boltar
who found the solution.
“Hey,” he said, climbing into the ebony train, “these things open right
up.”
“That isn’t the problem,” Vasta reminded him, “we can’t figure out how
to make them run.”
Undaunted, Boltar began fiddling around with the controls. He soon
stopped, however, when he noticed that the car evidently had no power.
Then, he noticed an indentation on the control panel about the size of the
ebony key that Elahte had given him earlier. Shrugging, he placed the key
in its slot, activating the car’s controls. Seeing a button labeled “Go”,
he did the logical thing: he resisted the temptation to push the button and
told the others what he had found.
Ha! Just kidding. On seeing the button labeled “Go”, he hesitated
about half a second before pushing it. His car, in turn, hesitated even
less before it shot down its tunnel at clearly unsafe speeds.
“Looks like Boltar figured out how to start them,” observed McCurry.
“Indeed,” Elahte agreed. “So it shouldn’t take too long for us to
figure it out.”
Several stories above them, Princess Elim paced her cell, bored. Prince
Lotekh didn’t feel confident enough to have her killed, but he felt fine
about throwing her in the “dungeon”. Technically, the palace didn’t have a
dungeon, but Lotekh had gotten around this by declaring one of the empty
pantries unpleasant enough to serve as a substitute. This made pacing hard,
as the pantry lacked sufficient space for a pacer to get used to moving in
one direction before running out of room and turning, but Elim did the best
she could. After a few hours, she had memorized the layout of the pantry to
the point where she could pace without thinking about it—which defeated
the whole purpose, really, but she wasn’t going to let that stop her.
An unexpected knock on the door caught her by surprise. “Hello?” she
called, just before her legs, which had kept moving in the absence of
instructions to the contrary, propelled her into a wall. “Oof,” she added,
pushing away from the wall and rubbing her face.
The door opened and Captain-Generals Tvanir and Mselt entered. “Good
day, Princess,” Tvanir greeted, “I trust you are well?”
“Oh sure,” Elim lied, “never better. And you?”
“I just returned from … an encounter with the rebellion, actually,”
Tvanir replied.
“How ironic.”
Tvanir grimaced. Mselt looked confused, but said nothing. “I was
wondering,” Tvanir continued, “if you know of anything called ‘Ampron’.”
Elim blinked. “Ampron? The Really Powerful Defender of Niceness and
Stuff?”
“That’s the one. What can you tell me about it?”
“No much, really,” Elim admitted. “I never paid much attention to the
old legends. Supposedly, it was a giant robot that defended the planet
against several invasions, until the Dread Masters of Shananah VII destroyed
it a while ago. Why do you ask?”
Tvanir and Mselt exchanged glances. “Chancellor Elahte has joined the
rebellion,” Tvanir explained, drawing a shocked expression from the
Princess. “He plans to use four giant penguins which were once part of
Ampron to attack our forces. Evidently, there are four ‘keys’ in the palace
that control them. Recently, four small artifacts in the Royal Shrine have
disappeared. I suspect this ‘Ampron’ may be real.” She grimaced again.
“Any advice you might have would be appreciated.”
Elim snorted. “Advice. Yeah, right.”
Tvanir shrugged. “As you like.”
“Since it’s likely they’ll attack here,” Mselt said, “we’ll be taking
you up to the Absurd Physical Harm with Prince Lotekh and me—for your
own safety, of course.”
“Of course,” Elim replied. “Does Lotekh know about this?”
Mselt hesitated. “Well … not yet. But he’ll see reason eventually.”
Elim was still laughing when the door closed.
In the shadows of the mountains miles north of the palace, those Aroruan
farmers who had gotten up early—which was most of them, as farmers
generally wake up at times others would consider very early—heard an
explosion seeming to come from the mountains themselves. Turning north,
they saw an enormous ebony penguin rising on a pillar of fire from a hole
halfway up the third-tallest peak. Confused, they sought the advice of the
local soothsayer, who checked her Book of Portents and discovered that giant
ebony penguins rising out of fiery mountains was a sign that the local
soothsayer wasn’t charging sufficient amounts for her services. Chastened,
she swore to appease the gods by raising her prices. The thankful farmers
declared a feast in her honor and went out looking for a fatted calf to
slaughter.
Back in the Control Room, Elahte explained his plan to the four remaining
members of the Ampron force. “Since we’ve already found the Penguins,” he
explained, “we can strike tonight.”
“What about the other rebels?” asked Vasta.
Elahte shrugged. “They mean well, but there’s not much they can do that
will help or hinder us.”
“What about the mayhem that Boltar’s probably out causing?” Dixon asked.
“Actually,” Elahte smiled, “I planned for that. There are three major
concentrations of AOL forces and three Penguins, plus Boltar’s, so I
assigned him to sort of wander around aimlessly. I think he can handle
that.”
“Sounds good,” Vasta said. “What about you and me?”
“We will search the palace for the fifth key. We must be able to form
Ampron before the Empire can send something really dangerous after us.”
“Right.” Vasta turned to the others. “You three get going.”
They nodded and headed off to the hangar. Within moments, three more
high-speed train cars were heading off to points unknown.
Having lived through the Zakavian conquest, the assassination in the palace,
the Elim-Jjana scandal, and the constant, although ineffectual, police
actions against the Aroruan People’s League, the inhabitants of Arorua’s
capital city (known as “The City”, although it’s real name is “The Capital
City”) considered themselves pretty worldly, especially compared to the
rural majority of Arorua, most of whom had never even seen a Zakavian. At
this point, they figured, nothing was going to surprise them. After all,
what could be stranger than a romantic link between Princess Elim and
Governor Jjana? Evidently, an enormous ebony penguin landing on the
outskirts of town and trading fire with the local Aroruan Occupation Legion
garrison was one of those things, and the reaction of the citizens could be
summed up in a single word: flee.
Even the Arouran People’s League, who were as close to jaded as Aroruans
got, were thrown into a panic by this turn of events. They calmed down
after they realized that (a) this was a good thing and (b) they had been
expecting it. Having realized that, they immediately began a raid on the
palace, reasoning that the Zakavians would surely reduce palace security
when giant, hostile robots attacked.
Inside the palace, Mselt had just finished suggesting that Prince Lotekh
accompany him on a visit to the Third Fleet in orbit when the first reports
came in. Lotekh’s reaction was immediate: “Bomb the city flat!” he
ordered.
“That would kill us, your Highness,” Mselt reminded him.
“But it would also destroy the Penguin, right?” Lotekh asked.
“Maybe. But then we’d be dead, and there would still be Penguins to
deal with.”
Lotekh stared. “There’s more than one?”
“Yes, sire.”
“How do you know that?” Lotekh asked, narrowing his eyes.
“Um…I…that is…,” Mselt fumbled, “these things usually come in
packs.”
“Really?”
Mselt nodded.
“Huh,” Lotekh said, also nodding. “I did not know that.”
“We’d better leave as soon as possible,” Mselt advised. “It will be
safer in orbit, and we can send a distress signal to Planet Gloom.”
Lotekh nodded, reluctantly. “You’re right. But tell Tvanir to sell her
life dearly, okay?”
“Ah … right.”
In the AOL’s Command Room, which was far less advanced and far more stylish
than the secret Aroruan Command Room several levels below it,
Captain-General Tvanir was trying to organize her understaffed forces
against the sudden threats. She was also trying to ignore the voice that
was telling her that if she won she’d always be expected to work with
insufficient forces.
“Another one,” a tech reported. “It’s attacking our installation on the
west continent.”
“That’s one here, one attacking the local garrison, one at the coastal
installation, and one on the west continent, then,” Tvanir summarized. “Any
on the south continent?”
“No, sir.”
“Do we have any forces there?”
“No, sir.”
“Any way to contact the fleet?”
“We couldn’t get funding for a communications array because we could
just use the Aroruans’ array,” another tech answered, “but no one knows how
to work the Aroruans’ array except the Aroruans, and they keep laughing when
we ask them to contact the fleet for us.”
“Lousy non-user-friendly software,” Tvanir sighed. “I knew I should
have learned it when I had a chance. Anything else?”
“A group of rebels just broke into the palace,” a third officer
answered.
“What!?” Tvanir demanded. “How did they defeat the guards?”
“Evidently they threw a lot of sticks and stones at them. The guards
just couldn’t handle it.”
“Wonderful,” Tvanir sighed, sinking into her chair and rolling her eyes.
She returned her gaze to the monitors just in time to see the rebels
defeating one of their expensive Model S-IVa Walking Tanks by crushing it
between two heavy logs. Idly, she made a mental note to report that design
flaw.
Elsewhere in the palace, the Aroruan People’s League’s strike force ran
through the mostly-empty corridors, some holding stolen deathkill blasters.
Giddy with their first real taste of victory, they cried out “Whoo-hoo!”,
“Yee-hah!”, “Gizzle fimp!”, “I am the Walrus!”, and other such nonsense
phrases.
At their head, their somewhat less excitable leader Bentor did, in fact,
have a specific destination he was leading the group to: the launch pad.
Since there hadn’t been any launches lately, he figured, it meant Prince
Lotekh was still on the palace. If he could capture Lotekh, he could
probably trade him to the Emperor for his planet’s freedom.
The strike team burst out onto the launch pad in time to see Mselt help
Princess Elim into the shuttle. They came to the obvious conclusion: “It’s
the traitor!” they shouted in unison. “Let’s kill her!”
“I am not a traitor!” Elim shouted back.
“Yes you are,” Lotekh said, from inside the shuttle, “you worked against
the Empire, remember? Since you’re an Imperial subject, that means you’ve
betrayed it.”
“True,” Elim admitted, “but I didn’t betray the rebellion.”
“Couldn’t we just leave her here?” Lotekh asked Mselt. “She’s a girl,
for crying out loud!”
“Shut up,” Mselt replied. “Launch!” he yelled to the pilot, noticing
that the rebels had been running towards them.
The pilot complied, and the shuttle began to lift off, forcing the last
few escapees to grab onto the landing skids. Fortunately, the shuttle rose
with enough speed to avoid the rebels, barely. The rebels, furious at their
failure, could only shake their fists in anger. By the time they remembered
they had guns, the shuttle had already established its shields.
Tvanir watched with a mixture of frustration and despair as her forces were
devastated by four giant robot penguins while rebels wandered freely though
the palace. Eventually, it occurred to her that she would probably want to
leave the area if she wished to remain free. “Okay,” she told her command
staff, “we’re getting out of here. Tell the troops to retreat as soon as
they start losing. We’ll meet in the Mountains of Tallness as planned.”
Oddly enough, the Zakavian forces began losing within seconds of receiving
Tvanir’s orders. At least, that’s what their commanders later claimed.
Bereft of opponents, the Ampron Force ceased their attacks and returned to
the Palace. After parking their Penguins by the palace, they met up with
Elahte, Vasta, and the rest of the rebellion.
“Great job,” Vasta congratulated them.
“Thanks,” Dixon replied. “Did you manage to find the fifth key?”
Elahte shook his head. “We will continue looking, though,” he added.
“I must say,” Dent commented, “I enjoyed that.”
“You would,” McCurry told him.
“Shut up, McCurry.”
While McCurry engaged in shutting up, the six were joined by Bentor and
Tels Garav, who had no doubt done many brave things in the battle, although
he got rather vague when asked about it.
“Great job, Ampron force,” said Bentor.
“I am amazed that worked,” added Garav.
“Well, I’m not,” Bentor announced. “We Aroruans have finally struck
back successfully! I say we celebrate!”
A cheer went up from the crowd.
“I advice against premature merriment,” Elahte cautioned. “The
Zakavians still have a large fleet in orbit.”
“But the Penguins could just smash it, couldn’t they?” asked a rebel.
“Maybe,” Elahte admitted, “but our pilots also need time to become more
proficient in their abilities. We will need all the advantage we can get to
defeat the Third Fleet: it’s taken on entire planetary armadas in the
past.”
The crowd considered that for a few moments.
Someone shouted “Let’s party anyway!”
And so they did.
Far, far above the Aroruans, hanging menacingly above the planet, was the
Zakavian Third Fleet. It’s commander, Captain-General Mselt, had just
arrived on the bridge of his flagship, and was exchanging news with his
flagship’s commander, Dfale. Not surprisingly, little had happened in
orbit; the only interesting news Dfale had to report was the unveiling of
the EDIT and the A/600 “Alpha Ra” Warrior-Ship. Mselt’s news was
significantly less cheerful.
“Open rebellion?” gasped Dfale. “I thought the Aroruans lacked the
spine.”
“As did I,” Mselt replied. “Perhaps there was some outside influence.
In any case, the Aroruans may soon have their hands on a giant robot which,
it is said, can take out whole invasion fleets. I suspect we should respond
in kind. I will record a communication to Planet Gloom in my office.”
Dfale nodded. “Yes, sir. If I may ask…?”
“We will fight giant robots with giant robots,” Mselt replied, “This
‘Ampron’ versus our A/600.”
“Ah. That should be … interesting.”