Achilles & Ajax

Running for his life, and for the people he cares about, Abreas has to time to think of anything else. Gripping his new weapon, the axe, he retraces the path his family took in escaping the carnage in the fields.

"Why?" he pants, glancing over his shoulder at the battlefield he's leaving. His breath is hot and ragged in his throat, but he doesn't dare slow down.

His beard, scraggly and unkept sway with the wind.

The axe feels heavier with every step, a reminder of the promise he'd made to protect his brother, his aunt, and whoever else is there. The sharpened blade glints in the fading light, thirsting for the blood of his enemies.

The wooden handle is sticky with the sweat of his palms, the leather wrapping worn from his frantic grip. The steel head of the axe is stained with the blood of battle.

To ensure the survival of the line of Achilles he needs to reach his brother Aloeus.

Abreas' legs burn as he sprints, his muscles screaming for rest, but he knows that he can't stop. The cries of the dying and the clang of swords are fading behind him, but he can't shake the feeling that the battle isn't over.

He is almost out of breath as he arrives to a scene of horror.

The small camp is in ruins. The smell of burnt flesh and metal fills the air, making his stomach churn. The once vibrant tents are now shreds of fabric fluttering in the breeze. The ground is littered with the lifeless bodies of soldiers and horses, their insides spilling out onto the dirt.

'This is the checkpoint towards the beach'.

Aloeus, holding a short sword, his horse galloping as he fends off the Athenians closing in on him, and the carriage that carries the Antigonids.

Abreas' heart hammers in his chest as he sees his brother's desperate battle. The sound of clanging metal fills his ears, mingling with the screams of dying guards and the panicked whinnies of horses.

The earth is full of mud and blood, each step he takes sinks into the morass. His vision narrows, the world outside the battle's chaos fading into a distant blur. The scent of iron thick in the air, and he needs to act now.

Without even waiting to regain his breath, he throws himself at the Athenians, swinging his iron axe against their bronze shields. The Bronze Age has long been over, but these people in these city states still use the old armaments left to them.

Looks like an oversurplus being reused.

The Athenians, caught off guard by the sudden onslaught, stumble back. Abreas' axe crashes down, slicing through a warrior's helmet, spilling his brain matter onto the mud. The man's legs buckle, and he drops like a ragdoll.

Another Athenian charges, but Abreas sidesteps and brings the axe blade up in an arc, tearing through the man's throat. Blood spurts like a fountain, painting the mud a deeper shade of red.

The Athenian's eyes bulge as he chokes, gurgling for air that they took for granted.

Abreas feels a feral snarl tear from his throat, a primal scream of rage and fear as he continues his charge. He's not just fighting for his life; he's fighting for the future of his family.

A sea of enemy soldiers parts before him, their eyes wide with terror at the madness in his gaze. His axe becomes a blur of death, cleaving through limbs and skulls with equal ease. The Athenians try to regroup, but the mud is slippery with gore, and their fallen comrades' viscera hinder their every step.

And behind Abreas' long beard, looking like a northern Viking, his large war axe an animal like expression, an ethereal visage of Achilles, handsome and bold can be seen overlapping him, striking paralyzing fear to the Athenians.

Abreas' muscles burn with the effort, but adrenaline fuels him onward. He's not just a man; he's the embodiment of the rage that comes with watching your world crumble around you.

Tears form in his eyes in fear and helplessness as he slowly inches forward in the sea of bodies, and loudly he shouts a prayer.

"Achilles if you can here me! Grant your son strength, I beg of you!!"

The battle rages around Abreas, each swing of his axe sending a spray of blood across the battlefield. His eyes are wild, darting from one target to the next as he fights with the ferocity of a beast.

The Athenians are like ants, scrambling and biting, but their puny efforts are no match for the rage and fear that fuels him. A soldier attempts to impale him with a spear, but Abreas catches it with the handle of his axe, wrenching it from the man's grasp and using the momentum to pull him in close.

With a snarl, he slices through the man's chest plate, sending his heart to thump uselessly into the mud. The man's eyes go wide, his mouth open in a silent scream, before his body goes slack and he topples over.

The Athenians, seeing their comrades fall like wheat before the scythe, start to retreat, but Abreas is relentless. He chases them down, cutting them off, giving them no quarter. His axe swings in a rhythmic dance of death, each strike more precise and brutal than the last.

"Abreas! Regroup with me!" Aloeus shouts, parrying an Athenian spear.

Abreas turns his head towards Aloeus and makes his way over. The two brothers side by side as Aloeus is off his horse.

"Where did you put that girl huh?"

"She's with aunt Cleopatra." Aloeus sighs. 

"Let it go. I didn't do anything to her, besides, she might benefit from this arrangement once I die. Uncle Euenios wouldn't treat her too bad."

"I fear this is the end for us... like Achilles and Ajax." Abreas and Aloeus on each other's backs fend off the Athenian assault, buying time for Pero to lead the others to escape.

Their idol's name hangs in the air, a silent battle cry, as Abreas' axe finds its way into the face of another attacker. The man's nose shatters, eyes pop out, and blood sprays like a mist as the axe lodges in his skull. With a grunt, Abreas yanks it free, only for the man's head to roll away, leaving his body to collapse like a puppet with its strings cut.

"These Athenians are relentless." Aloeus chuckles.

"And so are we," Abreas spits through clenched teeth, wiping the gore from his eyes with the back of his hand. His axe feels like an extension of his body now, moving almost on its own, as if guided by the very spirit of Achilles.

Aloeus uses his sword to parry a blow from another Athenian, the blade ringing as it connects with the attacker's bronze sword. With a powerful kick, he sends the man sprawling back into the muck. The two brothers stand back to back, surrounded by a wall of enemy soldiers.

Above the din of battle, the siblings can hear the cries of their retreating people, the clatter of hooves as the horses pull the carriage away from danger. They fight in perfect harmony, their movements fluid and deadly, a dance of death choreographed by the gods themselves.

As if the spirit of Achilles and Ajax possessed them.

If this is the end, so be it.

...

..

.

Pero rides her horse as fast as she can kick its stomach. Between her and the horse is a little Prince Krateros, his mother Cleopatra didn't even say goodbye to the boy, just placed him on her arms, and with a sword, chopped the ropes the speeding horse is using to tug the carriage.

The momentum of the carriage had it hurtling at high speeds towards the pursuing Athenians, crushing them on its weight, and presumably, Cleopatra inside it. Krateros looked back to find his mother, but she didn't even say goodbye.

She has robbed him of the privilege to hear her voice for the last time. Cruelty.

The thundering hooves of her steed echoed through the dirt path as the little Prince clung to her, her heart racing faster than the beast beneath them. Above the din of the retreating Antigonids, the sharp twang of bowstrings resonated, sending a cold shiver down her spine. A rain of arrows descended, as if Zeus himself had unleashed his wrath upon them.

But like Xanthus, the horse managed to avoid all the arrows.

'Come on, there's only a few minutes left of track...' Pero's focused eyes look forward, and Prince Krateros hasn't even cried once despite being like, 3.

The sound of the arrows sizzling through the air pierces the chaotic symphony of the battlefield. They are the Athenian archers, a deadly rain of projectiles seeking to cut short the line of Achilles.

Pero feels the wind of death graze her cheek as one whips by. Her eyes dart around, searching for a way to shield the child from the relentless onslaught. Her heart beats faster than the hooves of the galloping horse, each pulse a silent plea to the gods.

The Athenian archers, their eyes narrowed with determination, release another volley of arrows. The sky darkens with the promise of a crimson rain. Yet, as if guided by the very hand of Athena, the shafts seem to curve away at the last second, burying themselves harmlessly in the ground or lodging in the trunks of the trees that line the path.

(Plot Armor!?!? Duh, I wrote it this way.)

Soon enough the arrows thinned.

Pero's heart was racing so fast it was ready to jump out of her chest, but she had made it. They had made it. The little prince was safe in her arms, his heart beating in sync with the horse's rhythm, his wide eyes reflecting the chaos behind them.

In front of them some distance away are the Macedonian ships that have docked on soil. The rest of the ships are busy fighting the Athenians at sea. There to meet them was Hilarion of Epidamnus, the Admiral of the Macedonian Navy.

He's an old friend of Euenios, with a stern face, yet kind eyes. "Where are the others?"

But as Hilarion finishes his question, the silence that followed gave him his answer. 

"Come onto the ship, both of you and the horse." Hilarion was sent back to Greece by Prince Euenios to bring back the Army in Corinth, and the rest of his family but...

What's left of the Army is this horse, and what's left of his family are these two children.

The ships quickly withdrew into the open sea after extracting Pero and Krateros.

The Mediterranean spreads out before them, vast and unforgiving, a sea of deep blues and greens that stretch to the horizon. The sun, a fiery orb, hovers above, casting a warm embrace upon the waters. The waves, whipped by the wind, dance in a rhythmic crescendo, crashing against the hulls with a sound that is both soothing and foreboding.

The ships slice through the water, the oarsmen's muscles rippling like the waves themselves as they propel the vessels away from the shore. The salt spray stings Pero's face as she watches the land shrink in the distance. Her heart is a heavy stone in her chest, but she knows there's no turning back.

The sea around them is a canvas of color, shifting from the dark blue of the depths to the light azure of the shallows. The horizon, a thin line of silver, calls to them like a siren's song, promising both salvation and oblivion. The sun casts a golden light across the water, painting it with a fiery glow that seems to mirror the battle they've just escaped.

Pero clutches Prince Krateros tightly, feeling the tremble of his small body against hers. She can't help but think of her own mother and sister, their faces a blur of old memories in Sparta. The image is so vivid that it feels like a knife twisting in her gut, and she can't hold back the tears that stream down her cheeks.

She might never see her mother and sister ever again... Nor Greece for that matter.