|
Let's do this. In.
|
#
¿
Aug 9, 2016 13:16
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 09:39 |
|
|
The Sixth Sun 978 words. Ines ducked under the swing of the saber, narrowly dodging it but losing a few inches of hair to the blade. Better that than her head. There was a roar of gunpowder, and the bearded sailor attacking her lost his grip on his weapon and fell forward. "The men and I will handle the rest of this!" her sister Laura yelled, flintlock smoking, "Place the charge before the rest of the navy arrives!" Ines grabbed one of the ropes dangling over the edge of the ship, and climbed hand over hand, pulling herself onto the deck. The rough rope cut into her hands, leaving them bleeding by the time she had climbed aboard. "Yo!" she signaled one of the cutthroats the sisters had hired, still hiding on the dock. The greedy fools thought this was just one of the many opportunistic robberies and lootings taking place in the chaos of war, and probably planned take the entire plunder of tobacco and coffee in the hold from the naive girls who had hired them. The Sahagún sisters had no interest in exotic intoxicants however, and soon their hirelings would have no use for them. She swung the small loading crane on the deck around, and let loose the hook, which spooled out towards the man waiting on the dock, and he attached the large package the sisters had brought with them, carefully. He knew it was an explosive, the sisters had told them that much. It would do no good for it to go off prematurely. "All set miss! Reel 'er in!" Ines turned the crank as fast as her small frame could, lifting the bomb off the dock. It swung dangerously in the wind, nearly crashing into the side of the ship and ending everything prematurely. Finally it reached proper height and she swung the package around and pulled it off the hook. It weighed nearly as much as she did. She strapped it to her back with a harness she had made just for that purpose, and, with every bit of strength she had, she began to climb the main mast of the ship. Below, in the melee, the captain realized too late what was happening as he saw the figure making it's way through the rigging. He screamed to his men to stop her, but the assault on the ship by Laura and her men was doing it's job, and the sailors were too busy trying fighting to stop and get off a clean shot. Ines climbed higher and higher, but the end was still not in sight. The mast stretched high into the sky, disappearing into the clouds. Her arms and legs ached, then burned like fire, but she pressed on, nearly a mile high, but still nowhere near her goal. On the ground, Laura leveled her pistol at the captain, and shot off her last bullet. With a cry, he fell backward into the water, just as a fresh contingent of the Monterrey city guard arrived. Laura's ruffians, blindsided by the reinforcements, were caught by a volley of musket fire, and many of them fell right there. The survivors who still could scattered as the guard charged in, finishing off the dying. Laura stood her ground, taking a saber off of a dead man. She never got to use it however, and a pike pierced her chest before she could let out a cry of defiance. Blood pooled into her mouth, and as her vision blurred, she smiled, and laughed. The attack had served it's true goal, and Ines was too far along to stop now. Laura Sahagún had fulfilled her purpose. Now it was all up to her sister. Ines pulled herself up the rigging, one hand over the other. Seconds dragged into hours, into what must have been days. Finally, high above, she saw her goal. She redoubled her efforts, every muscle in her body crying out in agony. It would be so much easier to let go, and just plummet to her death. Just fall free, and float off into nothing. But she was so close. With her last ounce of strength she reached the top. She paused, and caught her breath, looking around. The earth curved below her, and she gazed from the tip of Baja up to Vancouver Island. Blue and brown and green swirled below her. A king bowing before a massive golden Buddha in his own likeness. Bandits plundering a small town. A riot in the streets of Bakersfield. Mormon zealots marching across the Colorado River, singing songs of praise on their way to conquest. Cannons destroying temples, walls and houses. She pulled the charge out of its package, and tied it to the mast. On the bomb was a simple four-pointed star, each of it's points a different color: black, red, blue and white. Ines lit the wick protruding from the center of it, and savored her few final moments as it burned down. The hearts of men were full of impurity and vice. They would be no more. The wick reached its destination, and Ines was obliterated in a flash of magnesium and sulfur. The fire traveled to earth like a bolt of lightning, evaporating the water around it as it consumed the ship, then spread along the ground, cracking it open and ripping it apart. The whole earth shook, and the sky split open. Across the western hemisphere, a second sun appeared in the sky as buildings fell and the first sun dimmed. In heaven the stars fell on the weakened brother Huitzilopotchli as they tore apart and reassembled their mother. Finally, there was quiet. Ines rose over the earth, as her hummingbird father had before, casting her feeble rays as she slowly burned hotter, and the north star settled over Monterrey bay, its new home. The sixth sun shines above a cleansed earth.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 14, 2016 15:11
|
|
|
I'm still in. Eagerly awaiting the next round. Failure is a learning experience, and  if I give up here.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 15, 2016 09:38
|
|
|
In
|
|
#
¿
Aug 16, 2016 00:29
|
|
|
In as an investigator
|
|
#
¿
Oct 18, 2016 14:51
|
|