CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

The Bow of Heracles, Part 1

When the giant shadow hurled its fists down on the Bow of Heracles, the impact of its attack caused the ground to shake violently.

Sam stumbled to the blackened floor.

“Get up!” he told himself. “Run!”

He had just enough time to pick himself up again before a shockwave of energy and pressure swept him off his feet and sent him hurtling toward the pile of rubble at the western end of the gallery. There was a loud ‘Bang!’ as his body collided with the rubble and then Sam slid to the floor while the world darkened around him.

ALERT! [Regeneration (ζ)] is working to counteract the damage. Refrain from taking action while this is in progress.

Seconds ticked by while he lay there drifting in and out of consciousness. It hurt to think. It hurt to listen too. And yet there was a persistent buzzing in his ears, voices ordering him to get up.

Get up, kid! The master’s disembodied voice cried. This is no time to play dead!

This was accompanied by Crow-Man’s own advice of, “Sam, that thing’s… coming your way… Get — bzzt — out of — bzzt — there!”

It wasn’t just static on the comms. Crow-Man sounded as bad as Sam felt, and this thought of an injured comrade needing to be healed was what allowed Sam to bring order back to his scattered consciousness.

“I’m…up…” he said groggily.

Sam picked himself off the floor while blinking away the black dots that were clouding his vision. He ached all over, but it seemed Regeneration was working its magic once more, turning what should have been several serious injuries into lesser throbbing pains that permeated his entire body.

“I’m up,” he repeated in a steadier tone.

A quick survey of his surroundings told Sam two things.

First, the giant shadow’s attack was akin to a bomb detonating inside the gallery. The devastation it caused was so great that much of the floor had caved in beyond the museum’s basement, giving Sam an unobstructed view of the sewer below.

The second thing Sam realized was that this fight was far from over. The giant shadow had not vanished along with its conjurer. In fact, the head was facing in his direction at that very moment. Although Sam couldn’t see its eyes, he was pretty sure it was looking at the broken ground between him and it.

“It didn’t get the job done,” Sam guessed.

No, it didn’t, although it demolished the statue, the master revealed. But the statue wasn’t the thing that made the Bow of Heracles special, kid.

Sam’s gaze drifted to what remained of the ground in front of him. There, perhaps only ten feet away and lying on a patch of floor that had sunk down closer to the sewer was an object that glinted in the darkness.

“That’s…that’s the actual Bow of Heracles?” Sam asked in disbelief.

He’d always assumed it was just the name for the famous bronze statue. He didn’t think it was a literal thing, and he doubted most people in his generation did either. The master even agreed with him on that point.

If you generation-z and millennial kids spent even half the time hitting the books as you do browsing social media, then you’d maybe learn a thing or two about ancient history, the master scolded.

Sam would have rolled his eyes at the master’s words, but he couldn’t pull his gaze away from the bow. “Holy Zeus… that’s really the bow Hercules used to slay the elder giants…”

“Sam, it’s co — bzzt — ming your — bzzt…” Crow-Man’s voice was barely audible through the earpiece which Sam guessed had been damaged somehow during his latest fall.

He didn’t need to hear the rest of the message though as it was clear enough what Crow-Man was alluding to.

While the giant shadow’s torso was stuck on the side of the gallery it had been conjured up from, the figure was enormous enough to bend forward so that its massive hands could reach the far western end of the gallery where Sam and the bow were. The one good piece of news for Sam was the fact that it was moving incredibly slowly almost like it was running out of gas.

“Styx,” Sam breathed as he struggled to his feet.

A quick look at his stats showed he’d regained a bit of his HP back during his near-blackout state. The rest of it wasn’t good though.

HEALTH POINTS (HP): 272/600 STAMINA POINTES (SP): 100/300 FATIGUE: 75%

“Less than half my total,” he breathed. “Freaking Herculean must have drained my stamina too…”

Kid, the master’s voice sounded very uncertain. Usually, I’d tell you to escape now because this fight might be too big for you as you currently are…

“… But we can’t let that thing destroy the bow,” Sam finished for him.

That thing’s just a shadow. It doesn’t have the strength to destroy a divine relic, the master explained quickly. I have to give it to the Trickster though… The bastard tricked us into thinking he’d cast a grand illusion when what he really did was to summon a piece of something monstrous into the mortal plane.

Sam was already moving toward the bow, but the master’s words caused him to pause in his tracks.

“You mean that thing’s,” his eyes glanced up at the approaching hands which were at least the size of monster trucks, “not an illusion?”

No…the shadow has too much power in it, the master answered. Can’t you feel it, kid?

Now that the master mentioned it, Sam did sense a wave of energy flowing out of the shadow that was far different from the biting cold that horrors exuded. Sam likened it to a whiff of warm steam leaking out of the door to a really hot sauna.

We’re lucky that shadow’s all the trickster could summon because whoever’s on the other side of that is packing some serious heat, the master added.

This realization caused sweat to dribble down Sam’s brow. It coated his back now too as a familiar feeling coursed through him. Fear, the kind that left one feeling powerless, gripped tightly onto Sam’s chest.

All the while, the giant shadow’s flickering form continued to reach for the glowing object on the ground between it and Sam.

Lesson number eight, kid. Courage isn’t the absence of fear. It’s the will to step forward despite the quaking in your boots! The master added hurriedly.

Sam wasn’t sure if it was the master’s words urging him on that made him do it, or if he was still feeling the high of breaking through to delta level, but he managed that first step forward. And every step afterward got easier and easier.

“We can’t let it take the bow,” Sam said, realizing on his own that if the giant shadow couldn’t destroy it then it was likely to steal the relic when it finally winked out.

He slid down to the patch of floor where the bow lay before the giant shadow’s hands could reach it. But the ground shook slightly as it took on Sam’s weight. The bow slid away from him and teetered over the edge.

“Don’t fall into the sewer,” Sam pleaded.

Above him, the shadow’s hands were like the canopy of a great tree. They blotted out the light filtering in through the hole in the roof. Luckily for Sam, its hands really were moving much too slowly. Its form was flickering in and out of existence more and more too.

No, Sam couldn’t rely on luck. He knew better.

He reached out for the bow, but his fingers hadn’t even touched its handle when the ground underneath him gave. Its collapse caused both Sam and the bow to plunge down into the sewer more than ten feet below.

Out of reflex, Sam’s hands darted out, one toward the bow and another aimed at a steel rod that was jutting out of a broken piece of cement about five feet down from the platform he’d fallen off of.

“Come on!” Sam yelled.

His hand grasped onto the rod, saving him from falling into the water that filled the bottom of the sewer. The bow escaped his grasp by inches though. It fell into the murky water with a soft splash.

“Styx!” Sam hissed.

Kid, look out! The master warned.

He looked up just in time to watch one of those two massive hands escape the lethargy that had taken its entire form and move quickly in the direction of where the bow fell.

Sam sighed just before he let go of the steel rod and dropped into the sewer too.

His feet splashed down onto the murky water about the same time as the giant shadow’s fingers brushed against what remained of the sewer tunnel’s roof, breaking through more of the museum’s concrete foundation.

“Seriously,” Sam breathed.

He dived into the waist-deep water to avoid the debris falling on top of him. He didn’t even think about how dirty the sewer water was. At least not until the rancid smell filled his nostrils.

Sam’s head broke through the water. Then he opened his mouth so he could gulp in as much air as he could.

“Oh, gods… I drank a bit of sewer water,” he sputtered.

The taste of sewer was still on his tongue when he saw the glint of enchanted bronze underneath the murky water not too far from where he surfaced. Unfortunately, the giant shadow’s hand was right between them with its grasping fingers fencing it in.

“No!” Sam took in a breath and then dived back in.

He held his breath and swam swiftly through the disgusting wastewater so he could get through the gap between the giant’s forefinger and middle finger. And it really was lucky they hadn’t shut on him when he wiggled through them.

Sam reached out for the bow that seemed untouched by the muck gathered on the sewer floor. His fingers clutched its frame, and that’s when he felt the soft vibrations emanating out of it. It was like he’d placed his hands over the hood of a sports car while its engine purred underneath.

He’d barely secured the bow in his hands when he felt the sudden surge of the water pressing behind him.

Sam glanced over his shoulder, and through the gloom, he saw the giant’s hand sweeping toward him. The strength of its passage created a powerful current that crashed into Sam’s back, plunging him and the bow he’d pressed to his chest spinning further down the sewer.