17. Reclaiming the Throne

Spider’s Lair

	The Priest was not the only demon....
	Ryan pondered the final words his mother had spoken.  Had she 
known about the Priest before he attacked?  He didn’t think so. 
His mother would have tried to escape if she had.  Had the demon 
priest told her what was going on before he killed her, when she 
had not had enough energy to escape?  That was more likely, but 
still not a good enough explanation for Ryan.  The demon had 
talked of his mother as if she was a meal, and he didn’t seem 
like the kind of being to converse with its lunch.  Ryan could 
think of only one other plausible explanation: she had known of 
the other demon and her husband without seeing the one that was 
eating her alive.  
	Ryan suppressed a shudder.  That demon had been insidious, 
acting completely pious while performing outright sacrilege.  He 
had called them all fools for believing in their goddess, and had 
shoved the fact into their faces when he said her full name with 
impunity.  Ryan wished he could kill him all over again.  Perhaps 
he could, in a way....
	“Sandy says she needs a few more days to fully repair herself 
from the spinal damage,” Scott told him, walking into the small 
room near the entrance to the lair, a room which Spider never 
used.  It was perfect for silent contemplation, which he had used 
it for, and for loud arguments when Spider dragged Philip in here 
several times a day, since it was virtually soundproof.  It was 
funny, now that Philip had stopped trying to have them kill 
Sandy, or do it himself, that he and Spider still found things to 
fight about.
	“Is she still refusing our help?” Ryan asked.
	“Same story too,” Scott told him.  “She won’t let us give her 
our energy since it isn’t an emergency.”
	“But she could be healed in less than a day with our help,” 
Ryan pleaded.
	“Don’t tell me that,” Scott replied with a grin.  “I’m on 
your side.  Besides, she’s your fiancee, you talk to her.”
	“I should,” Ryan said, his voice trailing off.
	“We’ve been back for a week now,” Scott told him, “and you’ve 
hardly said two words to her.  Spider says that Sandy is 
beginning to think that you don’t love her any more.”
	Ryan turned to his best friend.  “I love her more than words 
can say.  I really do.  It is just....”
	“What is it?”
	“Will you promise to keep this to yourself?”
	“Of course,” Scott told him.
	“It is just, since we fought the demon, I have really been 
looking at her - who she is, what she does, how she thinks - and 
I feel like so much less than she is.  As a person, that is.  She 
came here as an enemy, and has proved to have the purest heart of 
anyone I have encountered.  I know this sounds bad,” Ryan said, 
“but I do not think that I am worthy of her.”
	“Ryan,” Scott said, “as your best friend it is my duty to 
tell you: you’re being an idiot.”
	Those were not the words Ryan was expecting.  He opened his 
mouth to reply, but only squeaked.  “You have forgotten the most 
important factor in all of this.”  He turned and walked back to 
the door of the room.
	“What is this factor?” Ryan asked.
	“She loves you,” he said, leaning his back against the door.  
“Simply that.  She loves you so much that her original mission 
here no longer matters to her.  She would do anything for you, 
include giving her own life.”
	“It is still more than I have earned,” Ryan said sedately.
	Scott walked to Ryan and smacked him on the back of the head.  
“Wake up, Ryan.  If it weren’t for you, she would still be trying 
to take over this planet, or would have succeeded already.  All 
her goodness comes from her love for you.  YOU made her what she 
is, and YOU are the only thing keeping her that way.  If ever 
there was anyone who deserved her love it was you.”
	Ryan’s mouth opened again, but this time he could force no 
sound forth.  As much as his stubborn mind wanted to come up with 
a way to contradict what Scott had said, it could find nothing, 
and his heart overcame his head.  The self-depreciating voice 
left his mind as the depression left his face.  “Thank you, 
Scott,” he said, a smile of relief on his face.  “I have been an 
ass this past week, haven’t I?”
	“An ass in love needs no excuse,” Scott said as he opened the 
door for Ryan.  “Now go out there and show her you still love 
her.”
	Ryan grinned at him as he walked past him into the main 
trove.  As he approached the living area, he could see Sandy 
reclining against the backboard of the bed, watching TV, and knew 
that Sean, Spider, and Philip would be doing the same thing on 
their cots.  Philip had long since stopped trying to usurp the 
bed and had declared the cot farthest from the door, and closest 
to the television, to be Royal territory.  It had annoyed Spider, 
but amused Ryan and Sandy.
	Ryan took one look at her beauty and his heart leaped.  He 
walked up to her without her noticing and gave her a tender kiss.  
She jumped at first, but settled into it once she realized what 
was happening.  He slowly pulled back to look into her eyes.
	“What was that for,” she purred.
	“For the way I have been acting,” he said softly in her ear.
	Scott turned the volume up on the television to drown them 
out, giving them a bit more privacy than they had had.
	“I noticed you have been acting strangely.  I was wondering 
if I had done anything wrong.”
	“No.  No, you have done everything right.  My problem was 
with me.  I was afraid that you were too good for me.”
	Sandy’s eyes widened.  “Too good?  I have been afraid I have 
not been good enough.  I...I am still who I am.”
	“Yes,” Ryan said with a smile.  “You are the woman I fell in 
love with.”
	Sandy blushed.  She seemed to be becoming more demure as he 
became more worldly; they were rubbing off on each other.
	“You are always good enough for me, my love,” she whispered 
as she leaned forward and kissed him as tenderly as he had kissed 
her.
	“I am glad we have that settled,” Ryan said, lying back on 
the bed with Sandy in his arms.  “You are the one bright spot of 
my life at the moment, and I would hate to lose you.”
	“You will not lose me,” she said.  “As long as you need me 
and I need you, I will be with you.”

	The next morning, with all six of them gathered around the 
table, Ryan continued their plans on how to bring good back to 
the crown of New Rome.
	“I still think we should tell the people what is going on in 
the palace and get a stronger force against Father,” Philip said.
	“And risk all of those lives on a situation we are not sure 
of?” Ryan asked.  “I do not think it wise.”
	“Philip does have a point, though,” Sandy said.  “If the 
people know what is going on, they will be more likely to back 
Philip than aid the King.”
	“Personally,” Spider said, “I would not believe the story if 
I didn’t see it first hand.  The people aren’t stupid.”
	“So we publicly expose him,” Scott said.  “If they see with 
their own eyes that the King is an enemy, they will believe it.”
	“You’ve lost me,” Sean said.  “Just what are we exposing the 
King of.”  There was silence.  “So I didn’t miss the part where 
we found out just what was going on.  We should probably do that 
before we announce anything to the public.”
	“What do we know?” Sandy asked.
	“We know from old Trevor that all or most of the young and 
healthy have been taken to the room behind the throne and haven’t 
come out,” Ryan said.  “And Mother said that there’s a demon back 
there that Father is working for or with.”
	“So we can assume that the head demon is disposing of the 
young - probably eating them as the priest did,” Sandy said.
	“But why would the King go along with it?” Sean asked.
	“He could be under a spell,” Sandy said.
	“Or the demon could have something the King wants,” Scott 
added.
	“We should probably explore that possibility more,” Sandy 
said.  “Non-magical coercion is easy to break if we just get what 
the King wants away from the demon.”
	“What does your father want or hold dear?” Spider asked Ryan 
and Philip.
	“I thought he wanted the safety of his people,” Philip 
answered.  “He had always taught me that our first priority was 
to keep the people happy and secure.  If the demon was giving him 
that, however, it wouldn’t be killing all of those people.”
	“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Sean said.  “We don’t 
know yet if those people are dead, as likely as it is that they 
are.”
	“Assuming they are,” Spider said, “then what Philip is saying 
is true.  The King cannot be interested in the welfare of the 
populace.”
	“He cared about the family...once,” Ryan said.
	“And we can be damn well sure that he isn’t interested in 
that any more, either,” Spider said.
	“Does he want power or riches or anything else you read about 
villains wanting?” Scott asked.
	“Not from what I know of him,” Philip said.  “Yet, I do not 
know him any more, obviously, if I could have misjudged his so 
grossly.  I have been a fool.”
	“It isn’t your fault,” Sandy said to him.  “The King has had 
everyone fooled for a long time.”
	“But I am his son.  I should have noticed his evil.”
	“You care about him,” Sandy said.  “When a person cares for 
someone who is having problems, they give that person a lot more 
credit than they would give as an objective observer.  I’m sure 
there were a lot of things that your mind omitted or explained 
away, just because he is your father.”
	“This is all well and good,” Spider interrupted, “but it is 
getting us nowhere.”
	Scott, who was taking notes, nodded.  “Right now, we know two 
things.  One: we cannot rule out magical coercion, since we have 
seen that Sandy can’t see that kind of thing without seeing the 
subject.  Two: we can’t rule out non-magical either, since we 
don’t know what the King wants any more.”
	“Could the King be voluntarily helping the demon?” Sean 
asked.
	Philip glared at him.  “Father would never do that.”
	“You yourself admitted that you don’t know what your father 
would or wouldn’t do any more,” Spider said.
	“They are correct,” Ryan said.  “It is a definite possibility 
that Father is working with the demon and not for the demon.  He 
is not the man you once knew.”
	Scott’s brow became furrowed and he started writing something 
down furiously.  “When your father changed,” he asked, “how 
quickly did it happen?”
	“There was a small earthquake one night,” Philip replied.  
“We had thought he had only been shaken by the tremor, but the 
next morning, he was the way he is now, sort of.”
	“Sort of?”
	“Well, he was withdrawn and moody,” Philip explained, “but he 
was not the vengeful and cruel creature he has become recently.”
	Scott frowned as he scribbled wildly on the page before him.  
“When he became like this, what else was going on.”
	“What do you mean?”
	“In terms of people disappearing or being locked up.  And...”  
he paused, thinking, then his head snapped up, “and when did the 
priest show up?”
	Philip thought for a moment, and instantly he looked sick.  
“It was all at the same time,” he said.  “How could I not have 
seen it?”
	“You didn’t know there was anything to see,” Ryan said.  
“Father and I were practically strangers, and I never knew there 
was anything evil about him.  I just thought he liked you best.”
	Once again, Spider broke in.  “Hate to break up the self pity 
party, but we are wasting time, and lives dwelling on what we 
could and could not have done.”
	Scott shifted in his seat uncomfortably, but still took 
Spider’s cue to resume his analysis.  “So the two demons arrived 
at the same time, probably allied in purpose, and it seriously 
agitated an already disturbed King.”
	“The priest demon was given the Queen,” Spider added, “which 
probably didn’t help things.”
	“The head demon began killing off the healthy subjects and 
locking away the others,” Sandy said, “most likely just to keep 
them out of the way.”
	“And Father began acting rashly just to know that there was 
something he could do,” Ryan concluded.  “Even if he is allied 
with the demons as Mother said, they are still the ones with all 
of the power.  He would have to feel quite impotent by now.”
	“Impotent enough to put a price on the heads of both of his 
sons, just to show his power,” Philip groaned.
	“So we can explain some of his actions,” Scott said, “but we 
still don’t know why he has sided with them in the first place.  
So far, we haven’t been able to rule anything out.”
	“And I do not think we will be able to without seeing for 
ourselves,” Ryan said.
	Sean sighed.  “I know what’s coming next.  Which of us will 
go for the King and which of us will take out the secret room and 
the head demon?”
	Ryan almost smiled.  “You know us too well,” he said.  “As 
much as I would like to work with Sandy, that would leave the 
other party unprotected, so we will have to each lead a team.  
Since I don’t want our cover blown, Philip and Spider will be on 
separate teams to keep arguments to a minimum.  Philip and I want 
to know what is going on with Father more than anything else I 
assume, so he will be with me, putting Spider with Sandy.  I hope 
you don’t mind me putting the women together again.”
	“You know best,” Spider said with a grin.
	“That means Sean will have to be with me, just in case.  
Scott, since the demon will be more dangerous than Father, I 
think you should accompany Sandy and Spider to back them up.  Now 
that I think about it, I know the palace well enough to not need 
a skilled thief at my side.  Sean, you go with them too; Philip 
and I can handle Father alone.”
	“Sean,” Spider said.  “I think the guard uniform we took for 
Ayre will fit you - you’re nearly the same size.  Spider can wear 
hers and I can magically disguise myself.  Scott, you can be the 
bait: the healthy young man we captured for the demon.”
	“Is it too late to choose who I go with?” Scott asked.
	“As soon as we get in, we will not need to pretend any more,” 
Sandy told him.  “The guise is merely to get us in.”
	“I guess I’m no more a sacrificial victim in this than you 
three are,” Scott said grimly.
	“Philip and I should not need disguises,” Ryan said.  “He and 
I both know practically all of the secret passages and rooms in 
the palace, even if the one behind the throne was a secret.  We 
should be able to get through the palace unnoticed.”  Philip 
nodded in agreement.  “Be careful, you guys.”

	Ryan found the small knot in the wood paneling and pressed 
it, causing it to swing inward to reveal a passage.  He and 
Philip had both used this corridor as children to get to each 
other’s rooms when they were supposed to be doing homework.  Now 
they were using it to slip into Ryan’s room unnoticed, since it 
was closer to their father’s.
	Sandy had made the portal to Philip’s room at Ryan’s request, 
just because of this passage.  After making sure the room was 
secure, he and Philip had seen the others off and had begun 
making their own way to find their father.
	The princes wound through the corridor, and as soon as they 
found Ryan’s room to be empty, Ryan flipped the latch and walked 
in.  “I haven’t seen this place in so long.”
	“What happened to your lights?” Philip asked.
	“I stopped using electricity when I found out about the power 
shortage,” Ryan told him.
	“Oh yes,” Philip said with recognition.  “I do remember you 
going on about something like that.  What was that about?”
	“I overheard some of the servants talking about their 
electricity flickering and browning out late at night, so I 
decided to see if there was something wrong with the generators.  
When I got into the basement and asked one of the workers, she 
assured me that everything was fine, but I saw her worried 
expression and went on anyway.  I was right to do so.  The meters 
showed that the power levels were in the danger zone, too low to 
be a continuous source of power.  When I asked the worker about 
it, she told me that it had just recently gone that low, but she 
didn’t know why.  It could have been a leak, but it could just as 
easily been a mere increase in energy consumption.  Either way, 
she told me, there wasn’t a way to replenish the remaining energy 
as quickly as it was being used any more.”
	“So you chose to tell Father, who would not listen, and 
Mother and I wouldn’t believe you,” Philip said.
	“Exactly.  The little bit of energy I could save was nowhere 
near enough to combat the power drain, but it was all I knew how 
to do.”
	“You did all you could,” Philip said, opening Ryan’s door a 
crack to peer into the hallway.  “All clear,” he said.
	They stepped into the hall and entered a supply closet a few 
doors down.  Inside, Philip climbed the shelves and turned the 
smoke detector.  There was a small click and he lowered one side 
of the ceiling slowly, causing a rope ladder to fall out of the 
hole.  The two of them climbed into the small dusty tunnel and 
crawled for quite a distance.  This was the King’s personal 
escape passage, meant to be crawled the other way, from the 
King’s bed chamber.
	The room was empty when they emerged from the tunnel, but it 
looked like it had been used recently.  At the sound of footsteps 
in the hall outside, both Ryan and Philip quickly hid - Ryan in a 
wardrobe and Philip back in the tunnel.  The door to the room 
opened and Ryan heard the person, whoever it was, walking across 
the room.  The person stopped, and there was a swish of paper and 
the sound of something solid being placed down firmly, then the 
steps retreated pointedly back out of the room and the door was 
closed.
	Ryan opened the wardrobe door slowly to see if the person had 
really gone.  At the sight of an empty room, he emerged, as did 
Philip from his hiding spot.  Ryan immediately saw what the 
person had come in there to do, for there was a note on the 
King’s desk with a dagger embedded through it and the desk to 
hold it in place.
	“What is that?” Philip whispered.
	Ryan looked at the note and saw what Philip was asking about.  
What he thought was the sound of paper when the note was being 
placed, turned out to be something different, though he couldn’t 
tell what it was the note was written on.
	Philip touched it and turned pale.  “Mother,” he breathed.
	Ryan took a closer look as Philip began retching into the 
waste basket at the side of the desk.  The “paper” was human 
skin, bearing their mother’s birthmark.  Ryan’s knees buckled and 
he fell to the floor, gasping for breath.
	“Who would do such a thing?” Philip asked, recovering enough 
to speak, albeit shaky.
	Ryan couldn’t answer.  He couldn’t think.  He could only 
shiver on the floor.
	“I am guessing the ink is her blood,” Philip whispered with 
as much false strength as he could muster.  “Shall I read it?”
	Ryan managed a nod.
	“‘Dear Slave, your service lately has been severely lacking.  
I am giving you twenty four more hours, from the time you return 
from recharging in the generators, for you to bring me more 
humans, before I terminate your life.  If you had not noticed, 
this note is made from some of the remains of your dearly 
departed wife, just to show you how low you have become in my 
esteem.  I did not give you back your life so you could sit 
around and do nothing for me, and I expect more motivation from 
you.  Soon.  You will not be warned again.  Your Master,’” Philip 
finished finally.  Several times as he read, he broke off in 
tears or his voice gave out.  By the time he was done, a hatred 
was kindled in both princes for this demon who was controlling 
their father and abusing their mother’s dead body.

***

	Sandy, Spider, and Sean surrounded Scott as they walked him 
to the throne room with no trouble from the real guards.  
Apparently, no one bothered to find out who their fellows were in 
this place any more, and one person in a uniform was as good as 
the next.  Sandy had seen this before.  It was a sure sign of 
rough times when you workers stopped having identities and became 
interchangeable.
	Next to the throne stood a man in a red robe.  “State your 
business,” he ordered.
	“We have brought a man for the Master,” Sandy said, hoping 
that that was something close to what was normally said.
	“You must be some of Ashkar’s new pets,” the man said with a 
sneer.  “You look very lifelike, almost like real guards.  Soon, 
Ashkar will do to the rest of us what he did to people like him, 
because he has you,” he mumbled, pointing at Scott.  “Go right 
in,” he added with false pleasantness.
	Sandy stepped behind the throne and placed her hand to the 
wall, expecting to have to search quickly for some sort of latch 
or trigger to open the wall.  Instead, she encountered nothing.  
The wall was an illusion, and she walked through it, followed by 
the others.
	The sheer beauty of the room dazzled Sandy as she walked in, 
though she forced herself not to react outwardly.  There was gold 
everywhere in the massive chamber, and none of it was loose.  It 
lined everything, as if each object in the room was gold plated, 
not completely, but enough to show a high value.  Somehow Sandy 
knew that none of it was plating.  Every bit of gold she saw 
reached all the way through to the other side.  The rest of each 
object was either mirrored, or highly polished steel where 
strength was needed.
	The most striking thing, however, were the crystals.  Each 
was nearly seven feet tall and four feet across, and was 
suspended from the mirrored ceiling by golden ropes.  Sandy would 
have thought them beautiful if it hadn’t been for what was inside 
them.  Each one held a person, or something close to human, 
suspended without any signs of life.  None of them were 
completely normal, ranging from almost human to completely 
unrecognizable.
	“What’s going on in here?” Scott asked.
	“Ahh, another human,” said a musical voice, coming from all 
around them.  “I take it the King recieved the note I had sent to 
him in request of more subjects.”
	“Yes, Master,” Sandy replied.
	“You...” the voice said with alarm.  “You aren’t one of my 
prototypes.  Who are you and how did you know about me?”
	“Forgive us,” Sean said.  “We are mere servants and we heard 
rumors that you favored those who would bring you more humans.”
	“No one but the King and my Second know I am even on this 
plane,” the voice said suspiciously.  “Who really told you of 
me.”
	“The King,” Sandy said.  “We were guarding his room and heard 
him ranting about you.”
	“The King is no longer happy serving me.  I had suspected for 
a while, but now I know for sure.  Thank you, servants, for 
telling me.  Now about your prisoner.  He is not a noble, is he?”
	“No,” Sean said.  “The palace is empty of all but a few 
servants and guards.  We took the initiative and went outside the 
palace to get this one.  He is young and healthy, even if he is a 
commoner.”
	“Nobility is not a factor,” the voice told him.  “You three 
have done well in finding me an untapped resource.  I shall let 
you live so you can gather more humans for me.  In fact, I shall 
do better.”
	A green mist floated from the floor and swirled together at 
the far end of the room.  As it coalesced, it grew arms and the 
bottom separated into two legs.  A spray of it became what looked 
like chin-length green hair, and more became clothing.  When it 
was fully formed, a young man of unsurpassed beauty stood before 
them.  “I see you are impressed with the form I have created,” he 
said with the same melodic voice.  “Unfortunately it is no more 
solid than the mist it came from.  You will understand if I don’t 
shake your hand.  I am Ashkar, soon to be lord of this realm, but 
you may continue to call me Master.”
	“Yes, Master,” Sean, Spider, and Sandy said in unison.
	“You are good servants,” Ashkar said.  “Bring the boy this 
way and I will show you what I do.”
	Sandy stood behind Scott and shoved him toward Ashkar to make 
him begin walking.  They followed the demon past the gallery of 
misshapen humans and found that there was another room to the 
left that hadn’t been visible from where they had been standing.  
In the next room, still gold and mirrors, more crystals hung from 
the ceiling, but the humans in these still looked fully human.
	“This is where I keep the fresh subjects until I need them,” 
Ashkar told them.  “The ones out there are unusable for my 
present purpose, but may become useful in the future.”
	“What did you do to them, you monster,” Scott spat, being the 
only one of them who could ask questions without being suspected 
of anything.
	Ashkar looked directly at him appraisingly.  “You are a 
rather attractive human,” he said.  “Perhaps I will take a female 
body and keep you as a pet.”  Ashkar shifted his appearance 
slightly and became a woman.  “I have no gender,” she said, “and 
I can be very versatile.”
	Sandy couldn’t help but be a little amused.  Scott might have 
actually volunteered for that job if the situation were less 
dangerous.
	“As for what I did to them, you wouldn’t understand the 
processes, but I have changed them.  I am trying to make a 
corporeal body that is compatible with the amount of power I 
possess so I can enter your world physically.  A normal human 
body would be torn apart.  I began changing people by trial and 
error, which made some of the more grotesque things out there.  I 
found, though, that more subtle changes make them closer to what 
I need.  The problem is finding out what combination of changes 
will give me the result I need: a body I can slide into and out 
of without causing it any damage.”
	“Why not change a body back and start all over again?” Spider 
asked, forgetting her role.
	“Smart question, girl,” Ashkar replied.  “I have to map out 
all of the changes I will make and do them all at once, because I 
cannot alter a body twice.  Think of a human as a piece of clay.  
When you change the body with magic, it is like shaping it and 
firing it at the same time.  The new form becomes so solid that 
it can’t be changed without breaking it.”
	Sandy knew all of this already, but kept her mouth closed so 
she wouldn’t blow her cover.  She just nodded in understanding 
with the others.
	“At the moment, I am on the verge of breakthrough,” Ashkar 
said.  She pointed to Scott and froze him in a crystal.  “I won’t 
need him for another few days yet, and with luck, I won’t get to 
him at all.  I would prefer to get a body quickly and change the 
leftovers into something I can use, like warriors.”  She sent 
another of the golden ropes down to hoist the crystal containing 
Scott.  “Like I said, though, I may make some minor changes to 
that one to make him even more appealing.  He didn’t show fear 
like the others.  An inner strength is something I find extremely 
stimulating.  In fact...”
	She turned and walked into the gallery, then through another 
door on the other side.  Sandy, Spider, and Sean followed.  
Stopping at a small monitor, she began glowing, and the screen 
went through hundreds of rapid calculations.
	There was a large mirrored box behind the demon’s computer 
which began to hum.  Its lid then opened slowly, giving Sandy the 
distinct impression of a coffin opening.  Inside was a bed of 
crystal which was pulsating with a blue light.
	A crystal floated in from behind them and Sandy saw that it 
was Scott.  “What are you planning for him?” Sandy asked.
	“You’ll see,” the demon replied.  She turned the crystal on 
its side and lowered in onto the box.  “This is the hard part,” 
she said.  “I have to remove the crystal and close the chamber 
before he wakes up.  If he moves, then there’s no telling what 
will happen, and I can’t change him through the crystal.”
	“Perhaps if you told him not to move,” Spider said.
	“Interesting concept,” Ashkar said.  “And while I’m at it, I 
can get his clothes off of him so they don’t get fried in the 
chamber.”  The crystal melted away and Scott fell into the box 
with a thud.
	“What’s going on?” he pleaded.
	“Go along with what she says,” Sandy told him.  “She is going 
to make some changes in you, which you will probably be pleased 
with.”  She tried to show in her face that he should trust her.  
If the demon changed Scott, without making him a freak, he would 
be safe from her changes.  Plus, it would buy them some time to 
think of how to keep this Ashkar from doing any more damage.  
What could it hurt?
	Scott looked at her askance and she nodded at him slightly.  
“All right,” he said finally.  “What do I have to do.”
	“Remove your clothes and leave them out here,” Sandy told 
him.  “They won’t make it through the transformation otherwise.”  
Scott turned deep red, but nodded.  “Then lie in there without 
moving a muscle.  Any movement will alter the effects and give 
unpredictable results.”  Scott’s eyes became very large at that, 
but Sandy had something that might help.
	She smiled at him and said, “Relax, young man.  If you do 
those two things, you will come out of this experience in better 
shape than you entered.”
	“Guard, I am impressed,” Ashkar said.  “I may keep you in 
here as an assistant.  You are wonderful with patients.”
	“Thank you, master,” she said.
	Scott unbuttoned his shirt and handed it to Spider, then 
pulled off his undershirt and gave that to her as well.  Spider 
stepped away and began folding them.  Scott’s torso was slim, but 
unimpressive, rather pale and undefined, as were his arms.  
	He stepped out of his shoes and gave his socks to Sean, 
muttering, “the things I do for peace.”
	“We’re the ones who have to see you naked, big brother,” Sean 
whispered.  “You get the good end of the deal.”
	Scott shot him an angry glare, but removed his jeans and 
underwear and handed them to Sandy.  She took a quick glance down 
when Scott wasn’t looking and thought, poor guy.
	He didn’t waste any time hopping into the box and getting his 
body out of sight once he was undressed.  Sandy and the others 
set to work folding his clothes and laying them aside.
	“Perhaps humans aren’t as useless as I had thought,” Ashkar 
said once they finished and stood in a patient row.  “I could use 
some lab assistants as thoughtful as you three.  You, boy, in the 
box.  Are you situated and still?”
	“Yes,” he called back.
	The box gently closed so as not to frighten him into jumping.  
What had looked like a mirror on the front side of the bow was 
truly a window.  Sandy watched in awe as Scott’s body rapidly 
filled out and tanned, and gaped when she saw other things 
growing in the blue glow.
	She turned to grab Scott’s clothes so he would have something 
to wear, and found that Sean and Spider were way ahead of her.  
As the light died down, they rushed to the box with Scott’s 
clothing and waited for it to open.
	“Was it painful?” Spider asked as the lid opened and she 
handed him his pants.
	“I’ll tell you when the room stops spinning,” he replied.
	“You look good,” Sandy said, understating the matter 
immensely.  His jaw was strengthened, giving him a more striking 
face, which was even more augmented by dimples.  He smiled an 
embarrassed smile as they looked over his entire body, and showed 
off his perfectly even and straight white teeth, framed by full, 
but not too full, lips.  His eyes, now a more intense steel 
color, twinkled and sparkled, and his skin had a golden tan it 
had probably never had before.  His body, as Sandy had suspected 
it would be, was that of an Adonis, and the improvements reached 
lower as well.  If she had been how she used to be, she would 
have spirited him away right then and made him hers.
	“These may not fit you very well,” Spider said, handing him 
his clothing, “but put them on anyway, please.”  Apparently, even 
Spider was having trouble controlling herself.
	Scott dressed and stepped out of the box.  His clothing, 
which was loose before to hide his scrawny body, was now 
stretched nearly to its limits.  He turned to look into the 
nearest mirrored wall and gaped.  “That’s me?”
	“You like it,” Ashkar stated, obviously quite pleased with 
her work.  “Good.  As soon as I have time, I will retrain your 
mind to enjoy being treated as the piece of meat you are now.  
You will make a good toy once the ways to please me are ingrained 
into your mind.”
	“As for the rest of you,” she continued.  “Once you have done 
your jobs collecting for me, I will give you bodies just as 
beautiful so you can please my eye as you help me make my 
warriors.  Then I will train you as I train this boy.”
	Becoming a docile harem girl was not pleasing to Sandy in the 
least.  This demon, though she seemed pleasant on the outside, 
cared nothing for human life.  Sandy didn’t think she could 
possibly impress upon the demon that humans were good enough as 
they were, that she would be robbing them of what differentiated 
them from automatons.  Humans, to her, were as dogs or horses 
were to humans.  They had to be trained, bred, and maintained, 
and they would be loyal pets because of it.  No one was going to 
make Sandy into a pet.
	“That priest will be jealous when he sees my new boy,” Ashkar 
said.
	“You didn’t hear?” Sandy said.
	“Hear what?”
	“That Senshi Saggitarius destroyed the priest.”
	“Who?” the demon asked.
	“How much do you know about what goes on outside this room?” 
Sandy asked.
	“I know what my Second tells me.  I am really to busy to keep 
tabs on anything outside these rooms.”
	“So you don’t know that the King’s second oldest son 
destroyed the priest because it killed the Queen.”
	“I knew nothing of it,” Ashkar said.  “I just brought him 
along because he wanted to come to the mortal realm and play with 
some humans.  I didn’t see any harm in it.  So he and the Queen 
are dead now.  No big loss.  The priest was a fool to get himself 
killed, and the Queen was just a human.”  Ashkar was so flippant 
about the whole thing that it was scaring Sandy.  “I do wonder 
why my Second never told me any of this.”
	“I don’t trust him,” Scott said, sitting on the table with 
his back against the box.  “From what you’ve told us, I don’t 
think even half of the things that have happened have been from 
you.”
	“What does he do besides collect people for me?”
	“Before Senshi Saggitarius set them free, we had all of the 
sick and elderly locked away in the dungeon,” Sean told her.  
“And the King’s two sons are wanted dead.”
	“I told my Second to use his judgment.  I am sure those 
things were done to assist me in finding a body.  Besides, they 
are only humans.  It isn’t like a handful of sick and old ones 
are going to be missed.  And if the two boys are a threat to my 
plans, then they should be removed, don’t you think?”
	“Yes, master,” the three posing as guards said.
	“I guess his actions are logical, given you goals and 
beliefs,” Scott said hesitantly.
	“You don’t agree with them,” Ashkar observed.
	“I am a human,” Scott said.  “Each individual means something 
to me.  When you hurt one of us, it damages the rest of us 
mentally.”
	“Do the rest of you feel this way?”
	“I...” Sean began.
	“Go ahead, boy,” Ashkar said.  You have proved your worth 
enough to say what you feel.  If I do not like it, I will remove 
it later.”
	“I hoped that being in your favor would spare the ones I 
love,” he lied.  Sandy and Spider nodded in agreement.
	“A sense of community and shared lives, interesting,” Ashkar 
said.  “Thank you for telling me of this.  I will be able to 
remove it now, before it becomes a problem.”
	Sandy was overcome by a feeling of helplessness.  Ashkar 
could do as she wanted, and none of them could do anything about 
it.  She was just too powerful for them to stop.  The only one 
powerful enough to stop her was herself....
	Sandy had a plan, and began casting the smallest and 
imperceptible illusions and using the gentlest probes she could 
manage.

***

	Eventually, Ryan was able to stand again, and the two 
brothers headed for the basement, using passages only people 
raised in the palace would know.  The note had said that their 
father was down here at the generators.
	Since his last visit to the basement, Ryan noticed, the 
number of guards had dwindled down to nearly nothing.  They had 
encountered no one on their way, there were two at the door to 
the dungeon, and the lone guard by the generator room entrance 
made three.
	Ryan tossed a loose piece of plaster into the darkness to the 
guard’s right, and he and Philip ducked around a corner to his 
left while the guard was distracted.  They followed the side hall 
to the end, where there was a small janitorial closet, and pulled 
the cover off of a grate next to the door.  Guards were utterly 
useless unless they knew every way into a room, and this one 
obviously didn’t.
	The generators’ hum was low and weak, as if it were straining 
to create energy.  But that wasn’t the sound the caught Ryan’s 
attention.  There was a soft sobbing coming from somewhere in the 
room.  He followed the sound, with Philip close behind, until he 
found the source: a man on the floor, curled up like a baby, 
weeping.
	“Father?” Philip said.
	“Philip?” the man asked.  “Are you really here?”
	“We are both here, Father,” Ryan said.
	The man looked up tears running down well worn tracks in his 
cheeks.  His skin was pale and skeletal, but Ryan could tell it 
was his father, the King.
	There was something else, though.  His shirt was open and his 
chest was gone.  He could see the back of the King’s shirt 
clearly through the hole.
	“What happened to you, Father?” Philip asked.
	“My boys,” he told them.  “I am no longer alive.  I died in 
the earthquake that seems so long ago now.  There is nothing you 
can do to save me, but you must go now and save yourselves.  I 
heard what you did with the priest demon, and I am proud of you, 
but there are two others.  Ashkar is the leader, and the other 
one inhabits my body.  You must escape before he returns from 
stealing the power from the generators.”
	“We will not desert you, Father,” Ryan said.  “I will destroy 
this one as I destroyed the priest.”
	“You will?” their father said with a pride in his eyes that 
he had never seen directed at him.  “I can finally be freed of 
this walking corpse and join your mother, where I belong.”
	“So you know of her demise,” Philip said sedately.
	“Yes, but I could do nothing to stop it.  The only time I 
have control of my body is when the demon goes to feed off of the 
power supply.  If I venture too far away from him, I will fall 
apart.  I tried it a few times, but he just put me back together 
and reentered.  I have been useless for several years now.”
	“What can you tell me about this demon?” Ryan said.
	“Ashkar sent him, with my body, to collect humans for his 
experiments on the same night I was killed.  He is a lesser 
demon, though, and unlike the priest and Ashkar, has very little 
magical ability.  Defeating him will be no problem once he is 
back in my body - you need only decapitate it.”
	“But we can’t do that to you,” Ryan said.  
	“Do what, kill me?  Ryan, I am already dead.  As long as this 
body keeps going, I am stuck in it and cannot go where I am 
supposed to be.”
	“Ryan,” Philip said.  “I can do this.  The guard out there 
has a sword on him for show.  If you can get it for me, I can 
take care of the demon when it returns, and you can go help Sandy 
with Ashkar.”
	“You have someone facing Ashkar?” their father asked.  Ryan 
nodded.  “They are lost, then.  Not dead, but suspended,” he 
added when Ryan showed the dread he felt.  “Ashkar takes humans 
and transforms them to his own twisted purpose, but while he 
plans what to do with the next human, the unchanged ones are 
stored away in suspended animation.”
	“So I have to eliminate Ashkar by myself,” Ryan concluded.
	“You cannot,” his father said.  “Ashkar does not have a 
corporeal body.  You cannot touch him, but he can use his magic 
on you.  I fear there is nothing you can do.”
	“But I must do something after what he has done to you and 
Mother,” Ryan pleaded.
	“What did he do to her?” the King asked.  Ryan explained the 
note and more tears began streaming down the King’s face.  
“Ashkar did not do it,” he told them finally.  “He has his evil 
ways, but mutilation of corpses isn’t one of them.  The one you 
are after is his Second, a human who is utterly corrupt.  He 
stands guard by the throne when he is is not exercising his 
extreme cruelty.  He did what he did to your mother to torment 
me.  He knows perfectly well that I have nothing to do with what 
the demon that animates me does, and the the demon cares nothing 
for my wife.  There are a lot of things Ashkar is responsible 
for, but malicious cruelty is not one of them.”  
	“If it is so hopeless to stop Ashkar,” Ryan said, “then I 
have to go save Sandy and the others.
	He walked to the front door of the generator room, opened the 
door, and cuffed the guard before he knew anything was amiss.  
Ryan removed the sword and brought it to Philip.
	“Good luck, Ryan,” Philip said.
	“Yes, good luck, my son,” his father said.  “And always know 
that I am proud of you, and that I love you.”

***

	That should do it, Sandy thought as she placed the last 
illusion.  Now, to get Ashkar’s attention.
	“Master,” she called.
	“What is it, girl?”
	“I have been thinking about your problem with finding the 
right changes for a body to hold you, and I might have an idea.”
	Ashkar, once again in male form, turned his gaze to Sandy 
with a look of pure curiosity.  “I doubt it is something I 
haven’t tried, but go ahead.  Tell me of this idea.”
	“Well, maybe the problem is not with the changes, but with 
the subjects.”
	“An interesting thought, but if there was something wrong 
with the subjects, then I would have fixed it when I changed 
them.”
	“But what if it wasn’t physical?  What if all you really need 
is a human who already has some magical ability.  If the human 
was used to pulling magic through his body, maybe he could handle 
you better than a typical human.”
	Ashkar looked at Sandy as if she were speaking in tongues, 
but soon began smiling.  “I don’t know how you though of it, 
girl, but it just might work.”
	As Ashkar began scanning, Sandy covered herself with her 
first illusion: that she herself was a typical human.  Her next 
one fell onto the Second: an illusion of great magical ability.  
Both were illusions to magical sight only, since a person 
couldn’t tell someone’s power with just their eyes.
	Ashkar’s eyes lit up and he pulled his Second in with his 
power, quickly placing him in a crystal and bringing him into the 
metamorphosis room.  The computer screen went through figures at 
an alarming rate, nearly twice as fast as Ashkar had worked it 
before, and the demon shrieked with glee.  “This should work!”
	He turned his hand and dumped his Second into the box.  
Immediately, the crystal bed underneath him glowed red.  His arms  
and legs grew shorter, as ridges and plates developed in strange 
places on his skin.  His clothing was ripped apart by the energy 
being used to transform him.  His mouth shrank until it vanished, 
and his eyes sank into his head and dissolved.
	What was left afterword was little more than a potato shaped 
mass of flesh, but only Sandy knew it.  Her third illusion was a 
visual one of a man even more strikingly handsome than Scott.  
Under it, was the most difficult illusion, though, and the one 
Ashkar would be most likely to see through if he knew he should 
be checking for illusions.  While she was probing earlier, she 
had been checking the computers for what Ashkar was looking for, 
and how it would appear to him.  The illusion she now placed was 
somewhere between a visual and a power level, along with a 
certain hollowness, perfect for a demon to inhabit.
	“He is perfect!” Ashkar exclaimed.  He turned to Sandy.  “You 
can forget about working.  For this I will grant you the status 
of one of my lovers and give you the most beautiful body you 
could ever dream of.”  To Scott he said, “I am so glad I didn’t 
have to wait long to be able to touch you.”  He dove into his 
Second’s body, and Sandy waved her arms, banishing the illusions.
	“Gross,” Spider said, seeing what Ashkar had really jumped 
into.  “What did you do?”
	“I made the Second into a prison for Ashkar,” she said, “then 
covered it with illusions.”
	“You did it,” came a voice from behind them.  Ryan stood at 
the entrance to the room with an expression of complete shock.  
“You took care of both enemies in one blow.  Father said Ashkar 
couldn’t be stopped, but you stopped him.”
	“Ashkar is not stopped,” Sandy said, “only imprisoned.  Once 
the Second dies, Ashkar will be free again.  Is there a place 
where we can keep them safe and alive?”
	“Why don’t we freeze them,” Spider said.  “Ashkar can 
experience suspended animation for himself.”
	“I cannot freeze him fast enough to not kill him in the 
process,” Sandy said.  “My power is not that strong.”
	“Hold this,” Ryan said, reaching into his shirt and pulling 
out the stone King Cornus had given him as a gift.  He handed it 
to Sandy and she gasped.
	“This is the Community Stone!” she exclaimed.  “Its power is 
legendary.”  She held it in her right hand and pointed it at 
Ashkar.  With a flash, the demon was frozen in a block of solid 
ice, and Sandy handed the treasure back to Ryan.  “Thank you.”
	“You can use it whenever you need it,” he told her.
	“How did you get it?”
	“I will tell you tonight - it is a long story.  Right now, we 
need to put Ashkar somewhere where he will stay frozen,” Ryan 
said.
	“Easy,” Sandy said.  She opened a portal to another part of 
the world - part that was covered in the several-mile-thick ice.  
While it was open, she borrowed the Community Stone and used he 
almost non existent power over fire and made a blast big enough 
to melt a hole a bit larger than the demon.  Ryan picked up 
Ashkar and placed him in the hole, which Sandy then sealed over 
with more ice.  She closed the portal and once again returned the 
stone.
	“What about all of those people in the crystals?” Sean asked.
	“They will remain until Ashkar releases them,” Sandy said.
	“A bittersweet victory then,” Ryan said.
	“It was a bit sweeter for Scott,” Sandy told him.
	“Where is he?” Ryan asked.  “I did not see him.”
	“Yes you did,” Scott said.  “You just didn’t recognize my new 
body.”
	Ryan’s eyes bulged.  “What...?”
	“Ashkar changed me into a sex toy for herself,” Scott stated.  
“Not even she can change me back.”
	“He,” Ryan corrected.
	“Either,” Spider told him.  “Ashkar wasn’t to worried about 
gender, and assumed both forms while we were here.”
	“What are you going to do now?” Ryan asked Scott.
	“Get some clothes that fit,” Sandy replied for him.  “That is 
all he can do now.”
	“I don’t mind,” Scott said with a grin.
	Sandy suddenly noticed something.  “Where is Philip?”
	“He is staying with Father in his final moments,” Ryan said.  
“He will be up when Father is gone.”  Sandy could see in his eyes 
that there was something Ryan wasn’t saying, but she chose to let 
it remain unsaid for now.
	“I am sorry,” Sandy said.  “First your mother, then your 
father.”  She embraced him, feeling immense sympathy for Ryan.
	“I will get through this,” Ryan said, “but thank you, my 
love.”

***

Afterword, three days later...

	“Do you, Crown Prince Ryan Jovis, take Duchess Stardust to be 
your lawfully wedded wife?”
	“I do.”
	“And do you, Duchess Stardust, take Crown Prince Ryan Jovis 
to your lawfully wedded husband?”
	“I do.”
	Philip smiled, placing Sandy’s hand into Ryan’s.  “Then by 
the power invested in me, as King of this Kingdom,” Philip said, 
“I now pronounce you husband and wife.  You two may now kiss.”
	This was Philip’s first official action as King since his 
coronation that morning.  He had insisted that marrying their two 
new heroes would give the populace something positive in the 
light of all the tragedy.  Ryan wasn’t going to argue.  He wanted 
to marry Sandy as soon as possible.  There was nothing he 
wouldn’t do for her, and he wanted to prove it to her by going 
through on the promise he had made her, what seemed like eons 
ago.
	Scott, standing next to Ryan as his Best Man, had had no 
trouble finding a date for the reception.  In fact, he had gotten 
so many requests that he could choose from practically any woman 
in the Kingdom.  He had settled on a girl he knew from his high 
school days, whom he knew to be relatively nice.
	Spider, the Maid of Honor, had declined making it a double 
ceremony, much to Sean’s relief, saying that neither of them was 
ready to commit just yet.
	Ayre was in the front row with some boy Ryan didn’t know, and 
near him were Raoul and Kate, all of them on the Bride’s side.  
Jack and his date sat across the aisle on the groom’s side, along 
with old Trevor.  Out in the crowd, Ryan also spotted Kelli, who 
had sent him a letter saying she wouldn’t miss the wedding for “a 
kazillion bucks,” and near the back was the man Ryan had met at 
Timeless Diner, whom Ayre later introduced to Ryan as his father.
	The days after they defeated Ashkar were full of hectic 
running around and taking care of business.  The people had 
accepted Philip as the new King even without hearing the story of 
what had happened in the palace, but Philip had told them anyway, 
opting to keep nothing from them.  Ryan had to go through the 
ceremony naming him Crown Prince, a title he had never expected 
to have, and another one, on the steps of the palace with Sandy, 
Scott, Spider, and Sean, to receive medals of honor and to be 
named as heroes.
	But the titles and awards meant nothing to him.  His parents 
were dead and all of those victims were frozen in time.  The 
victory was a hollow one.
	He looked into Sandy’s eyes.  She knew how he felt, and that 
she was the oasis in a desert of sorrows.  He could never get 
through this without her, and he loved her even more for it.

*****************************************************************
*****************************************************************

Author’s Note:

	Hey readers.  This episode, if you hadn’t noticed, was 
considerably longer than any of the others.  On my computer, it 
was seventeen pages exactly (single spaced).  Now, I intended, 
when I began the Stellar Senshi, to follow the general formula 
for Sailor Moon, and with short episodes of three to four pages.  
That worked for a few episodes, but I found that I was thinking 
of more and more to put into an episode than the same old formula 
of Major Enemy Throws Minor Enemy at Senshi, Senshi Transform, 
Senshi Attack, Senshi Win, Villain Goes Home Vowing Revenge.  The 
more I thought of adding, the more complex the episodes became, 
and the number of pages skyrocketed.  When I got to episode 8, 
“Strange Team”, I finally abandoned the formula to take the 
storyline in new directions, and I have been enjoying it a lot 
more.  As you can see, in some episodes (like this one), Stellar 
Senshi don’t even appear.
	I am at once exhausted and exhilarated now that I have 
finished this episode.  Frankly, I didn’t even know how it would 
end until I got there.  I assumed Ryan would show up and save the 
day, as I had planned when I had him leave his brother and 
father. But Sandy, once again, surprised me, as she has been 
doing over and over again.
	Another thing I hadn’t planned on was Scott’s transformation.  
It happened so suddenly I just went along with it, adding a touch 
of humor here and there to break up the heavy drama.  Similar to 
that, the demon behind the throne was just a malignant force when 
I first thought the episode out.  There was no way I could 
predict Ashkar would develop such an interesting personality.  
He/She was so interesting that I toyed with the idea of making 
him/her stick around and reform, but I decided against it.  
Ashkar’s personality just didn’t mesh with “good”.
	Now for the exciting news.  I have finally made a tentative 
plan for the rest of the season.  What I have now will be split 
into two Acts.  The first is titled “Ryan” and the second, 
“Sandy” since they are the prime force driving each Act.  “Sandy” 
has three more episodes to be written, and then a heavily 
constructed Entr’acte, which will be more like a midseason movie 
than an episode, where (and I’m not spoiling very much by saying 
this) Sean and Spider WILL get married!
	After the Entr’acte will be three more Acts, titled (as far 
as I know now) “Night”, “Eclipse”, and “Nature’s Rebellion”.  I 
can’t say too much about them without giving away a lot.  “Night” 
deals with Duke Nightshadow and Nightwind.  “Eclipse” deals 
with...well...Eclipse, whom I can’t wait to bring out.  “Nature’s 
Rebellion deals with a spell gone awry and will be considerably 
shorter than the rest.  Hmm...five Acts with the final one being 
the shortest...sounds familiar....  Who says I’m not using a 
formula?
	Now that I have told you my plans, you can drop me a line at 
jlallen@umich.edu and tell me what you think of the story so far 
and what you’d like to see happen.  Who knows, I might just use 
your ideas.  Thank all (both?) of you for reading.

	Synge, demented child dragon to the stars, signing off.

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