The Cost of Doing Business part 7

[Captain Lachlan Bellraven]

   I'm really not sure what happened next , it became a bloodbath, the creatures mindless flailing and clawed fingers versus bullets and blades, while mindlessly viscious, the effectivemess of their attacks were somewhat hindered by th fact that once the fight began the seemed just as happy to rend each other as us. To make matters worse, for every one that fell the stench inceased, I heard a scream from behind me and watched as Brown, one of my best combat boarders was literally washed over by a wave of filthy subhuman flesh and he dissappeared flailing into the inky fluid all around us. Over the noise of the battle I heard.

    "Thats it , my children, give your lives , spill life to grant  ME MINE!! " I turned shaking off a creature that once upon a time might have been a woman, as she hit the ground I slammed my boot down and her head burst like a rotten melon, covering  by boot and pants with fetid putrid slime. I saw the old professor now floating over the pool sreaming like the mad demon he truely was urging the creatures to attack and die.

     "Go my children !... feast well on the unbelievers!! " Things were starting to look bleak I had lost two men and while Mr Steelcastle an Mr La Treau were still holding their own, we would all eventually get tired at some point, which in retrospect I suspect was his plan.At that moment I knew what had to be done, it was risky but we had no choice.

     "Brace!" I screamed to alert my men to what was about to happen, I pulled out one of the aether gernades we had "confiscated" from a British shipsometime earlier, we tried one once and understood why they were suppossedly "banned" but not it seemed our only hope.They looked to me in horror as I tossed the brass shpere into the lake of muck and bodies around us diving to the ground , we were immediately covered by a swarm of bodies  but it wouldnt matter. A deafening roar filled the carvern as polychromatic fire blazed in all directions the sounds of sreaming creatures and the smell of roasting flesh enveloped us and then in a matter of seconds it was over. We stood up shaking off the burned and dying mass of unhuman scum that now cringed and whimpered shivering in the grip of agonizing burns pleading in some unholy language for release.

    "My...my Captain..that was most...unsporting" The old wizard still hung suspended in the air his clothing burned away as well as most of his skin, clumps of burned flesh dropped off him into the ooze below." I was...to live..." he coughed and blood spewed out of him " I ..was..to " his body fell into the toxic mix of death and gore .Our lanterns werent too damaged and  we were able to find our way back out quickly, thankfully all the creatures appear to have been in the chamber and our path once free of the old mans influence appeared to be just another passage still covered with all manner of depraived and obsciene carving but , the devilish allure that drew minds to it seemed to have faded.

     By the time we were almost outside we could see daylight just yards in front of us, we heard it, the last thing we wanted to hear "Captain" the voice now truely inhuman a gibbering growl noise more like a beast but somehow we all knew what it meant. We began a flat run to the entrance and then just as we crossed the threshold into daylight we heard the voice again from the darkness inside " I am not defeated, the pretender will feel my wrath!" A look passed between Mr Steelcastle and myself , he reached into his vest pulled out the second gernade we took with us and threw it hard into the black openning of the temple. Somehow this explosion seemed even more powerful and the very ground all round us began to shake as the temple face began to come down, acrid smoke came pillowing out of the collapsing doorway as blocks of the walls began to rain down collapsing over the entry. As we raced back over the clearing to the ship we could feel the very ground beneath our feet giving way as we got closer we saw the tentacles that held the ship had withered and she was already making to make lift off. As soon as I entered the ship I grabbed the first comm tube and shouted to the bridge "Captain to bridge ! get us the Hell outta this Hell ! "  As we looked to the ground we could see the very earth openning up and the blasphemous place being devoured by nature herself as if in revenge. "Captain ," the voice of Rollie my mechanic came out of a comm tube," we were able to straighten out the shaft enough to get up and move but dont expect any kinda speed till we can get back to a proper dock and find a wa to recharge the main batteries to full."

     "Lovely" I thought to myself " Make for port ,I'll be in the main hold" I half ran to the hold wanting to prove to myself that the old mans gold was still there I threw off the tarp covering the boxes ,"Ok, " I thought " Boxes still here good start" I then counted the boxes, all fifteen were still there. I openned up one of the boxes and examined the contents as I examined each box in turn it was all the same 10,000 coins each box the coins counted and bundled, each coin a gold 10 rubel peice minted  by the Royal Russian treasury, 5,500,000  gold rubels. I began to feel better about the whole affair till I found the note in the last box

   As I read it a chill went up my spine

" My Dear Captain, if you are reading this then congradulations ,it would seem you have managed to escape. I felt it only fair to warn you that while I no longer have any need for such simple things as money, the rightful owners of this coin may well enjoy doing you considerable harm when they attempt to retrieve it. A former colleauge of mine who holds considerable sway over the Russian royal family is rather attached to this fortune since it took him sereral years to aquire it from their private accounts. So, just call this friendly warning my last act of humanity.

Your Servant

Professor Elias Mortimer Grandyke

"Great ," I thought , Stolen treasure, not that that matters in and of itself , but the Russian royal family, "Just beautiful, not the first time I have been chased by a government,  I  guess our lives are about to get intresting" I folded the letter up and stuffed it into my vest pocket." Just another item in the cost of doing business.