Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. It’s time once again for a trip to Eternia, where the endless battle between good and evil continues. Join Ibentmyman-thing and Matthew K as they bring you a brand new story featuring some of your favorite Masters of the Universe characters. Welcome to Eternia…
Too much land. Octavia was surrounded by too much land, and was uncomfortable being dry-docked in such a way, but Hordak had commanded it and there was little room in the Horde for debating one’s point of view. Catra and Shadow Weaver were out of commission. Leech was nowhere to be found. Hordak needed extra arms, and Octavia had those to spare.
Hordak had long suspected the rebel base to be somewhere in the Whispering Woods, but the various enchantments had made it impossible to find out for certain.
But magic was gone, and that meant the woods were unguarded.
Octavia had set her craft down far enough away from the Whispering Woods so she wouldn’t attract attention if the rebellion happened to be stationed here. She had her doubts, but, again, it did no good to question Hordak.
The woods were a brightly colored miasma of sights and smells, bristling with exotic plant life that grew nowhere else on Etheria. The trees grew tall and thick, and at the bases of those trees squatted shrubbery that plucked every color from the rainbow. It was a sickening place, and made Octavia twice as homesick for the flat monotony of the Sea of sigh.
Already, this felt like a wasted trip. There was nothing in these woods but the sickening colors and the cloying smells.
Still…
She had the feeling that she was being watched.
Though she saw nothing, she felt a prickle on the back of her scaled neck that alerted a deep, animal instinct of preservation deep inside her, alerting her to danger somewhere, unseen but very close.
She heard a soft sound to her right. Her finned ears pricked, but after a moment was satisfied that the sound she heard was nothing.
Hordak had sent her on a fool’s mission.
Again, something she could not say outright, but it was true.
She was about to turn back when she saw something flick past her field of vision to her left. One of her four tentacle-arms reached behind her back and grasped the edge of a sword. She scanned the woods, distracted by the multitude of colors.
Colors, but no sound. Strange to have so much vegetation but no sign of animal or insect life. An engulfing silence had spread across the woods. As if the entire woods was holding its breath and waiting for her to leave. Deep in the depths of the ocean, stillness usually meant that there was a predator somewhere, lurking and awaiting its prey.
Octavia wasn’t sure which she was: predator or prey
There was a hissing sound. Octavia’s first thought was that it was a snake, but almost of its own accord one of her tentacles reached out and snapped an arrow out of the air. It cracked it in two and then two of her tentacles pulled a pair of swords from their sheaths at her back.
A second arrow sped through the air, and she quickly sliced it in two with a downward stroke of her sword. The pieces spun to the ground, the tip of the arrow digging into the ground.
A figure moved into view. A human holding a bow. She didn’t recognize him, but she did recognize the woman who popped into view beside her.
“Force captain Adora,” Octavia said, spreading her thin lips into a smile full of sharp, thin teeth.
“Just Adora, if you please. Leave these woods.” She was holding a small pistol. Beside him, the human aimed another arrow at her.
“Only two of you? Seems I have you outnumbered,” Octavia said. She leapt upwards and grabbed the low-hanging branch of a nearby tree. Adora squeezed off a burst, but Octavia was already swinging up and over. A spare tentacle grabbed the pistol from her hand and she vaulted her, and Octavia was dropped down behind them.
The human let another arrow fly, but Octavia batted it away and wrapped him in the last tentacle she had free. She transferred the blaster to a free hand and pulled another sword from behind her back. With three swords and a blaster, she absolutely had them outnumbered.
“Without your magic trees to hide behind, you’re nothing special. I think I’ll call Hordak and have him bomb these woods to the ground. ”
“We’ll fight you. We’ll never stop,” the human coiled in her tentacle said.
Octavia laughed and squeezed harder. He cried out, and Adora raised her hands.
“Stop! We’re not resisting. We surrender.”
“You know, ex-Force Captain Adora, I’ve never been able to respect the word surrender.” She squeezed again, harder than before, enjoying the human’s screams and the pained look on Adora’s face.
Octavia laid the edge of a blade against the human‘s throat. “Strange how She-Ra is nowhere to be found. Usually that witch is flying to your rescue on her winged beast. The rebellion has managed it’s pathetic resistance to Horde will on a backbone of sorcery and trickery, but now that Etheria has been cleansed of the impurity of magic the time of true power is upon us.”
Adora shook her head. “You know nothing of true power, Octavia.”
Octavia was about to disagree when pain suddenly shot through the tentacle holding the human, causing her to release him. She turned, and something bright and sparkling punched her hard in the face. She spun backwards and was caught in a pair of hands. She was suddenly launched into the air and then dropped from a great height. The ground was hard, and she lost her grip on her swords.
She tried to move her tentacles and get to her feet, but she found that they were suddenly bound together in some type of… netting? She looked around, and found she was surrounded on all sides by women. The jeweled one grabbed her by the throat and lifted her easily, slamming her against a tree. Her tentacles were helplessly bound, and the woman holding her by the throat was too strong to get away from.
The human male struggled to his feet. “You ladies took your time saving me,” he said, rubbing his side gingerly.
“You do make lovely bait though,” Adora said.
Octavia struggled for some way to get free, but she was pinned, weakened, and helpless against this woman’s strength. Adora had been joined by four other women, each as bright and colorful as the woods in which they stood. She was sickened by it… revolted by it all.
“The Star Sisters aren’t powered by magic, Octavia, and Netossa has no powers at all, just ingenuity, skill and a hatred for the Horde. You’ve overestimated the Horde’s reach… and your own.
