Mythlands: THE HEIST

Part Two: The Pipes of Pan

Asgard - the formerly Shining City

Eris stepped forward and bowed down in front of the Throne of Bones. 'My Lord Loki, for thy entertainment, I present the piper Pan, who hails from mine own celestial sphere of Olympus.'

Loki's hand curled around the skull of Odin and he nodded. 'I shall hear him, for in truth tis a melancholic refrain that Loki  doth desire, to suit mine own mood.'

'Be it one of discord oh great one? For if so, tis mine speciality and Pan shall play a discordant tune on sweet Eris's instruction.'

Loki, master of all creation, signalled that it should be so and the celestial busker, did play his pipes and aye, the refrain was bittersweet, as was meet, for the mien and grim mood of Loki, King of Asgard and Master of the forces of Evil, did dwell mightily on the events of past and present.

As the music played, Loki beckoned Eris forward. 'What news of the rebel forces?'

The Olympian goddess bowed low. 'Queen Jadis reports that the rebellion of the Kami has been crushed. Hachiman and Amatsu-Mikaboshi lay dead and their realm entire slaughtered. However The Glass Cat and his alliance remain beyond our grasp my lord.'

Loki sighed. The conquest had mostly been completed almost two years ago but since then his own alliance of all the gods of evil, had fragmented. Once they had conquered their own realms and helped crush the rest into submission, eight gods of evil so far had turned against him, forcing Loki to annihilate entire pantheons. Then there was Bungle - The Glass Cat had fomented rebellion against his rule and formed a substantial alliance and the God of Evil had been forced to divert resources to ending this threat.

To tell the truth, Loki hadn't anticipated what being in charge and conquering all of the Mythlands would actually be like. For so long he had schemed and planned, but when it had finally happened, he then had to face up to the two paths before him. The first was to win the peace and to do that, he was faced with the task of reigning in a huge segment of his allies who were pure forces of destruction and only wanted to bring ever-lasting darkness and blight to wherever they could. Ever-lasting darkness was all very well, but Loki preferred to not rule over a wasteland!

That of course had led to him having to spend a lot of his time, getting rid of former allies and fighting attempts by other gods of evil and dark demonic leaders, trying to usurp him. His second problem was the tedium of ruling itself - the conquest was the fun part, but now he had to control infrastructure, sort out legislation and provide basic services. For instance the Council of Wicked Witches were forever hassling him about rebuilding the Yellow Brick Road, which had been mostly destroyed since Oz fell. They kept saying that without reliable transport links, how were they expected to bring him his tribute or move troops of demons and others from the army of evil, around the realm to suppress the populace.

He had found himself making bargains with local warlords, such as in the Domain, where a deal with the Zodiac meant it was mostly left alone, except ... it's pretty hard to control mindless forces of destruction, such as the ones from Pandora's box, wraiths of Mordor and others that just wanted to kill and wreack havoc. Try telling Deadites to respect the territory of his governors!'

Suddenly Loki looked up. 'Bard! What didst thee just sing of?'

Pan bowed low. 'I call this one the refrain of the Great Old One's my lord.'

A chill came over the Trickster and he turned to Eris. 'Why doth this wretch sing of ... them?'

Eris swallowed. 'Ah my good lord Loki, twas the next item on the agenda. T'would seem the Old Ones hath finally stirred from Charn.'

'But they refused to leave the Vault!'

'Ah, not exactly noble Loki. Cthulu didst communicate they wouldst leave in their own time. They have ... ah ... manifested in the land of Narnia.'

Loki put his head in his hands. 'To what end?'

'THE End my lord.'

The Trickster groaned. This was exactly the kind of ill humoured loutishness that took a perfectly good apocalyptic conquest too far!!