West Berlin

1986

11:15 p.m.

Lyn fell to her knees, breaths labored and lungs on fire. Snow fell like fine powder and fierce gales blew her hair back. She looked at her trembling hands, burnt as if evil coals sizzled inside them. Her bow Styx rested on the ground beside her, transforming back to the pearl necklace. Anna, the phoenix haired beauty stood before her staring sullenly.

Irene kept her spot atop the boulder, observing, violet eyes blazing. Lyn broke into tears, submitting to the searing pain of her hands.

“I — I can’t do it,” Lyn said. “It’s too powerful. I can’t wield it!”

Anna’s hand smashed against Lyn’s cheek. Sparrows observing in the trees above dispersed. Lyn winced as Anna gripped the soft fabric of her dress and lifted her. Anna gritted and threw Lyn to the ground.

“So, that’s it? You’re just giving up?”

Lyn closed her eyes, hearing a blood-curdling shrill. A massive blade fell, followed by a wash of blood.

I was too weak. I couldn’t protect you… I couldn’t protect anyone…

Her hands healed a moment later, and she groveled on the wet forest floor. “Anna, tell me what to do…” Her face hovered a few inches from the ground as she prostrated herself. “I don’t want to be weak… I don’t want to see the people I love get hurt again — ”

Anna turned away, exposing her back to Lyn. The straps to her toga fell from her shoulders, stopping just below her lower back. Lyn stifled a gasp, face mortified. Irene released a soft sigh, looked away.

Deep scars lined Anna’s back, going in erratic patterns along her flesh. Her injuries also ran along her shoulders and down to her rear. To complement the scars, included several brands: Three conjoined triangles.

Anna’s face softened, but her body tensed. “I was accused of witchcraft,” she said. “I couldn’t confess to a crime I didn’t do. So, they murdered my family and made me watch…”

Lyn stood in place, dumbstruck.

“Cook Anna! Clean Anna! Pray Anna, one day you’ll find a good husband!” Her voice quavered, and her eyes became wet with tears. “I prayed right as they were about to burn me. While I was beaten and whipped. But they were never answered! Then, I realized — that I was a woman, living in a world built by murderers.”

Irene left the boulder, grabbed the straps of Anna’s toga and lifted it over her shoulders, giving her a comforting hand. Anna ambled to Lyn and scooped the necklace off the ground. She grabbed Lyn’s hand, uncurled it like a spider opening its legs and dropped the pearls onto her palms.

“I got away that night,” Anna said, voice solemn. “When I was running through that forest, on the precipice of death, that was when I met him…” Anna closed her eyes, pondering. “He held me in his arms that day and breathed life into me, Drake. I felt like a piece of dust and clay given life…”

Lyn took a breath, clenched the pearls. Fierce determination returned to her eyes; she planted a foot and attempted to stand. Anna nodded, stepped between Lyn and the boulder. Lyn inspected the colossal boulder, covered in dents and meager scratches from her bow.

In an entire month, she accomplished nothing more than a few dents. It infuriated her, and she called the bow’s name. “Styx!”

It glowed, morphing into the silver bow in her hand. Anna did the same, the bow forming in her hand, its string made of a cruel crimson heat. She formed an argent bolt of energy, aiming it at Lyn.

“You have two options,” Anna said. “Pick up that bow and fight, or die…”

“Lyn! Lyn! Lyn!”

Kalen’s voice broke the veil of her fantasy. She opened her eyes, shot a look at him. He waved a hand in front of her. Kalen opened his mouth, but as he spoke, a roaring train soared past them in the opposite tunnel. They stood in the subway, having just exited a maintenance shaft. Faint lights illuminated the way but were overcome from the darkness of stone walls.

“Lyn, you okay? I was talking and next thing I know you just zone out…”

She scoffed, pushed past Kalen. “I’m fine…”

In mere moments, her nocturnal vision awakened. She welcomed the darkness and the tranquility it brought. Lyn took in everything around her from squeaking rats squeezing into tight crevices, subtle electricity cackling from the railways or the Stasi patrol walking down the tunnel ahead of them.

Kalen sniffed the air and growled, like a wolf tracking its prey. He gestured to her to halt, turned and said: “Are you sensing that too?”

Her rain-like eyes glowed in the darkness, yellow petals surrounding her pupils within a sea of blue and green. She ignored him, pressing deeper into the subway to pinpoint the smell. Winding narrow tunnels seemed to go on perpetually as another train flew past them, scattering trash and debris in its aftermath.

Off to the side near another maintenance shaft was a security station where several armed guards stood watch, conversing in German and smoking Pall Malls. Lyn and Kalen clung to the shadows, stalking their unsuspecting prey. They raised their suppressed pistols and waited for the next train to pass. It echoed down the tunnel and a few seconds later emerged, bright headlights cutting the darkness.

They opened fire, scoring a headshot on each just as the train disappeared. Oblivious to the shots, the guard standing watch at the door drew from his cigarette, exhaled in the air. Lyn drew a knife from her boot, came up from behind and drove it into his lungs while also covering his mouth.

His screams muted, and she watched the light extinguish in his black spider-like eyes. She placed him on the ground and stood by the door, peering through the open slit. Two more guards sat at a table inside, playing a game of cards. Kalen stood on the other side, nodded and kicked open the door. The guards snapped their heads towards the door just as several bullets ripped through their bodies.

Their corpses fell from their seats to the ground; a pool of bright blood forming. Another man came around the corner, bug-eyed at Lyn and Kalen’s sight. He reached for the pistol still attached to his side, but met Lyn’s steel flying into his chest. He choked, looked down at the blade impaling him, and fell backward. Lyn ripped the blade from him and proceeded to a ladder leading up a manhole.

Kalen glanced at the corpses. Though they were East German Police, he couldn’t discern the difference between their uniforms and Nazis. Nothing changed in style save for lighter gray shirts and trousers. It only lacked a swastika or red band around the right arm.

So, fascism disguised as communism…

Lyn plopped open the metal cover with one push that made a prominent clang. Once again, she found herself consumed by darkness. She left the utility hole, checked her surroundings. A mannequin stood before her; a woman, face rotted all to hell with smudges for mascara on a rotted wooden stand. Lyn grimaced, kicked the mannequin down.

Thump…

Inside the building, she heard soft whispers followed by a bright light. A man appeared from another room, submachine gun and light towards her direction. She dashed for cover behind a desk with chairs stacked on top. The light illuminated a section of the room, identifying more mannequins.

Are you fucking kidding me?

The light hovered over her, going towards a door on the opposite end. She waited for him to pass. He strolled past her, weapon at the ready, proceeding cautiously. However, he failed to notice her body curled into a ball near the desk. Lyn raised her pistol, fired one shot that hit his knee.

The man grumbled, dropped his rifle. She swooped in and cut his throat with one deliberate slice that soaked her blade. His body went limp, and she dragged it away behind a desk. She stood, but stopped suddenly.

A sequence of red numbers appeared, clouding her vision. She closed her eyes and shook her head. When she opened them, the numbers flashed again, digitalizing before becoming bigger, closer, as if right in front of her. She felt a dull, jarring pain in her head, and groaned.

Melchior: Seven. Fifteen. One. Two. Nineteen. Seven. Twenty-five. Six. Thirteen. Six. Seven. Fourteen. Zero.