Amazon Apocalyse 2: Chapter 81 (Patreon)

I returned to the farmhouse that evening, since all my tools were out at my place. If I wanted to craft the talisman I had to leave Crown Hill. Sakura stayed in town, helping Margaret, but Bridget came back with me, just in case Lisette followed me home.

The evening was uninterrupted, though, and I was able to work in peace. Crafting the Talisman of Protection from Good and Evil was fairly straightforward, though as I finished it, I realized the quality of the Lava Elemental’s core would play a large role in how strong the talisman was. I was glad I’d be saving my Chaos Talisman for the larger elemental.

I tried to exchange more messages with Myrina. Things were happening back on Themyscira, and not for the better. Time seemed an increasingly precious resource these days, with so much to do across multiple worlds. Bridget and I were both surprised when, despite waiting the entire night, we received no response.

Something was wrong, but what? I didn't like it, not one bit.

What would happen if I was cut off from her completely? Without a teleporter on Themyscira, I was pretty much stranded on Earth. We didn't have the skills to teleport across the multiverse—and wouldn't for many years.

I had plans in motion that required access to other worlds. I refused to lose that to Elder Thalassa's scheming. But until things were finished here on Earth and I'd spent enough time at home, there was little else I could do.

Thankfully, my plan for Lisette had shaped up nicely—at least in my mind. I would capture her, sooner or later. Preferably before she caused more trouble than she'd already given me. I glanced at the talisman in my hands. This would be the key.

I spent the night curled up with Bridget. The bed seemed oversized with just the two of us, but perhaps that was because I'd gotten used to getting cozy with two women.

Morning came the following day, and we returned to Crownhill. Sharky spent the entire night patrolling around the farmhouse, so we rode on his back all the way to Crownhill. We had to take the long way, though. After yesterday's fight, the Lava Elemental was out for blood.

We made our way to the city gates, where I was swiftly greeted by Frank, along with some bad news.

"What's with the grim look, Frank?" I asked. He'd been the one we were worried about, so seeing him up and about was a relief.

"It’s Chuck…" Frank shook his head. "She must have gotten to him sometime after the mission last night when we were celebrating our victory over that Lava Elemental. We each had a few drinks and he wandered off for a moment, but never came back. When we found him again, Lisette had gotten to him. It looked like she'd been working on him for a while, too.”

Frank scowled. “By then, Chuck was closer to a living zombie than a vegetable, like the others."

"Dammit..." I cursed.

Chuck wasn't particularly high on the totem pole of authority here in Crownhill, but he had a fairly high level and was good to have around. Apparently, that was enough to make him a target in Lisette’s eyes.

"Were you able to secure him? I know he's pretty durable."

Frank nodded. "With Sakura's help, yeah. That helmet you gave him made it a real pain in the ass, though. Sakura had to bash it real good before his head was ringing enough for us to tie him up. The guy broke his wrists three times to escape the cuffs.”

He snorted. “Somebody who heals as fast as he does is tough to keep down for long. Thankfully, Doctor Roswell had the perfect setup for completely restraining a humanoid subject for vivisection. It worked well enough on Chuck."

"I'm glad Doc was able to help."

"Oh, the Doctor was overjoyed. He was very… uh… very interested in Chuck's regeneration abilities. And since he isn't exactly in his right mind... we may have given the doctor the impression that it would be okay to study Chuck in the hopes of finding a cure for whatever it is Lisette is doing.”

Frank shuddered. “But just to be safe, we want to find a cure before the doctor goes all mad scientist on us."

Hopefully, Chuck wouldn't remember anything about whatever was going on right now.

"With Chuck gone, this is even more urgent. Come on, Frank, let's have a chat." I steered Frank away from prying eyes.

I wasn't sure how closely Lisette was watching me, but having her overhear this next bit would ruin everything. I made it look like we were just grabbing coffee. Someone had taken over the old coffee shop, which made it easy. She was a former barista who had done a remarkably good job so far, though once we started running out of oat milk and coffee beans, she'd need to get creative with the drinks she was serving.

Hot morning coffee in hand, Frank and I stepped to the side outside the barricade at the edge of town. The buildings here had been stripped by scavengers, but they had yet to be reclaimed. Being this far outside the barricades would be dangerous for anyone below level 10, but with the militia patrolling everything from here to the Crownhill County Prison, the area was safe enough that people above level 10 could wander around freely and begin reconstruction efforts.

It wouldn't seem strange for Frank and me to survey the area.

"What's all this about? Why are we out here, Carter?" Frank eyed me warily as he sipped his cup of Joe. "And what's with all the cloak and dagger?"

I took a sip from my own cup. "I'm looking out for you, Frank, that's what. I don't want you to get your brain sucked out your dick."

Frank held back an involuntary shiver. "Yeah. I'm still holding out hope the guys will come to their senses… in time. Doc says it's probable that the effects of whatever Lisette did will wear off with time. It's a pain in the ass running the militia without them."

"Which is why I made you this." I reached into my pocket and withdrew the Talisman of Protection from Good and Evil that I'd crafted.

It looked like an ancient piece of artwork from a long-gone meso-American civilization. It was roughly the size of a soldier’s dogtag, but the bulk of the material was solid gold. Pure ruby would have been better, but I had plenty of gold and not many rubies—certainly none large enough. Several unique patterns were inscribed along the length of the talisman. In its center sat the core of the Lava Elemental we'd slain yesterday.

"Is that the Lava Elemental core?" Frank asked. "How'd you shrink it down so small?"

"Very carefully.” I chuckled. “It took a bit of shadow and space mana to pull it off. That talisman was ten times the size and weight when I was crafting it. The gold in that thing alone is worth more than either of us made in a decade before the System."

"And this will protect the wearer from Lisette's tricks?" Frank asked.

"It will."

He held it back out to me. "Then you should keep it. If Lisette gets to you, this whole shelter is done for."

I shook my head. "I'm resistant to Lisette's abilities already. I'm not sure how much that's my doing and how much that's thanks to Bridget and Sakura's help, but I think the talisman would be wasted on me.” I poked him in the chest. “No. You are Lisette's next logical target. I want you to have it."

Frank fingered the talisman. "I've never gotten a gift like this before."

"I'm glad you like it."

"I would have preferred a beautiful woman gift it to me, but I guess I don't have your luck." He smirked at me.

I chuckled. "Well, hold on there. I didn't say this was completely free. The best way to make use of that talisman would be offensively."

"Of course there's a catch. Now I don't feel so bad about taking this thing." Frank sighed as he placed the talisman around his neck. He tucked it beneath his shirt, where it couldn't be seen—the same place I liked to keep Myrina's token.

I laughed. "Isn't there always? Now, here's my plan..."

***

By the time we were done, Frank knew the part I needed him to play and had reluctantly agreed to do so. I didn't want things happening too quickly, and my return to the city was bound to have Lisette on edge. So, per my instructions, we'd begin Operation 'Capture the Courtesan’ tomorrow evening.

That would ensure Frank was at the top of his game, and let us properly bait and set the hook. Tonight, Frank would stick close to Kerrie and some of her new trainees. They'd be enough to make it look like I was desperate to guard Frank, to keep him out of her clutches.

That was exactly the impression we wanted to give her. Any gap in our defenses would be left by design. At least, that was the plan. It was simple enough to be sound, and while something would no doubt go wrong, I hoped the general idea was flexible enough for us to fix it as needed.

I retired to my apartment in the city again, this time with both Bridget and Sakura. The three of us got comfortable, and the two of them spent a considerable amount of time 'Lisette-proofing' me, as the two of them liked to call it. We were just finishing up when my bag of holding started vibrating.

"Carter, did you stick a cellphone in there or something?" Bridget asked as she picked up my bag of holding. "It almost feels like you're getting a call."

"It does, doesn't it?" I tried to stand, but Sakura held me tight in her arms. She was feeling particularly needy since I’d spent the previous evening with Bridget, and she’d been on her lonesome.

Bridget tossed me my bag of holding and I went through it on the bed. I shoved my whole arm inside and rummaged around until I finally found what was vibrating. It was a thin, rod-shaped piece of metal. When I pulled it out, I saw a light flash on one end.

"Oh, Carter, why didn't you tell me you brought toys? We could have put this to good use a few minutes ago..." Sakura said as she reached for the vibrating metal rod.

I laughed and pushed her hand away. "It's not that kind of toy, Sakura. It's a communication device. Galbatorix the wizard gave it to me to communicate with him and the Dragon Lodge. He wanted a private line, in case he and his people wanted to place a special order and my normal teleportation network wasn't sufficient.”

I sat up straighter. Galbatorix had been right to worry, because that was exactly what was happening now. Communications were down and I couldn't get through to Thulga—and through her, Myrina, Cyra, Misa, or any of my people on Themyscira.

I looked at the flashing light, then remembered how the whole system was supposed to work.

"Quick! Read off the long blinks and the short blinks. I need to decode the message..." I stood, and this time Sakura let me go. She and Bridget watched the vibrating and blinking rod and called out the message to me, one blink at a time.

I had to grab the key for decoding the message out of my bag of holding. After taking a brief glance at it, I handed it to Bridget. "Sakura,” I ordered, “you write down the order of the blinks—long and slow. Bridget, you translate those into symbols. I'll translate the symbols into English." The three of us quickly got to work.

This was exactly what I needed! Whatever had happened to Myrina and Thulga, it was stopping me from communicating with them. But Thalassa wouldn't know about my deal with Galbatorix and his lodge. The wizard had always seemed a bit aloof, like him staying in town was doing a big favor for the Samhain Clan.

I wasn't sure how powerful the Dragon Lodge was, but I was willing to bet it was strong enough that Elder Thalassa wouldn't bust down the door to Galbatorix's shop on a whim. No, this was perfect.

He might have given me this device to talk about his purchase orders, but if I could get him to check on Myrina for me, I would have a secret line of communication that would let me know what was happening on Themyscira. It might even be possible for Galbatorix to arrange for my return, whether Elder Thalassa wanted it or not.

Transcribing the message would have been a lot easier if it was just Morse code. This was similar, but required an extra step. Bridget and Sakura called the code, which I had to match to a symbol from Galbatorix's language, of which there were apparently hundreds. Only after writing down the symbol could I use my Forerunner title to translate the text into something I could understand.

"Green bird of seven feathers swallowing the sun. Face of a man with two horns. Rat wielding a spear and shield. The atomic structure of hydrogen..." Bridget called out the symbols one after another.

I felt like we were deciphering hieroglyphics while being timed. I shouldn't have been able to manage the feat, but perhaps all those points I’d put into Intelligence were showing their worth. I only had a moment to glance at the key, yet when Bridget listed out the symbols one after the other, I recalled their shape and form with effortless ease.

As we translated the message, I realized why this form of communication wasn't popular. It turned what might have been a paragraph-long email into an hour-long event.

"Okay, so he's saying hello. He mentioned some trouble getting through to me via the channels I left him. Apparently Thulga isn't in Valkyrie's Watch any more. There's some trouble with the Samhain Clan. Also, he wants more copper wire..."

The message went on and on. Apparently Galbatorix didn't consider the translation and decoding process that big of a deal. No doubt he and his peers had put considerable effort into mastering the skill of using these devices.

I drummed my fingers against the table. "Alright, you two, I want to send a message back to Galbatorix. Sakura, there should be a button on that thing you're holding. It should transmit the message back to the device's twin."

"Okay, going in reverse now…. I swear, I feel like I'm back in college with all this frantic writing." Bridget swept her hair aside.

"I'll keep it short and simple: Please send current state of Amazonian Clan."

I forced myself to think a little harder. Whatever language Galbatorix was using didn't make names easy. There was certainly no direct translation for Myrina or Cyra's names. I had to talk my way around it, referring to the two of them as clan princesses. Hopefully Galbatorix would understand what I was asking about.

Sakura was nearly through translating the first line into button presses when a frantic knock came at the door.

"Crap. What is it now?" I grumbled.

I stood and found a nervous woman on the other side of the door. I didn't recognize her, other than the fact that I remembered Kerrie had been giving her orders the other day. She was probably one of the new recruits we'd saved from the apartments near the prison.

"Um... uh... Sir. T-that is, Mr. Carter? Or no, Mr. Smith? It's just that..."

She seemed terribly nervous, wringing her dress in her hands.

I was more than a little annoyed at being interrupted just when I finally had a way to catch up with Myrina again, so the angry expression on my face wasn't doing her nerves any favors. I grabbed her wrist to stop her fidgeting, then forced my expression to settle, so she would calm down.

"What is it?” I asked. “You can tell me.”

She was really nervous about something. "It's the clinic, Sir! The prisoners have escaped, and now Frank is nowhere to be found! Kerrie ran off after him, and now we can't find her, either."

"What?!" I jumped to my feet.

Apparently, while I'd been preparing my trap, Lisette had been planning moves of her own.