Battle for Peruna by Josiah Boss (book club suggestions TXT) 📕

more correctly, they were keeping an eye on the ex-minotaur, James Harrison.
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Week eighteen.
I am great. I am James Harrison, but I have the speed, power, strength, and size of Grunwick the minotaur. I am unstoppable-no one is greater than I. I am the best, the number one, the big cheese. I....am God!
“Thou, fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee.”
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“Welcome back for the start of the second half of this game. In the first half, James Harrison had thirteen sacks for a total loss of 195 yards. The opposing team-the Dallas Cowboys-are on their third string halfback after the first one cracked a pair of ribs, and the second one broke his upper arm and dislocated his shoulder. Both of these injuries came out of the crushing tackles from James Harrison. Here are the replays.”
“Look at that, he doesn't even care that he injured that guy,” said Skye, pointing to the screen, where Harrison thrown out the first string halfback.
“I read in the newspaper that he hurt an average of three players per game this season. And this last game he's trying to put out eight Cowboys on the disabled list,” said Fletcher. “He likes to hurt and injure other players.”
“There he goes again,” pointed out Garth. Grunwick was charging down field to stop the kick returner. Several attempts to stop him proved futile as “the Beast”-as he'd been nicknamed-charged through every attempt.
Then he and the kick returner met-hard. The crunch could heard and almost felt through the room. Both went down, and neither got up. The stands were absolutely silent, watching, waiting to see even the smallest move from either on. Nothing. Instantly, a dozen men swarmed the two. Within a few minutes the kick returner was carried off the field. A few minutes later “the Beast” was carried off.
A few minutes later the report came. The kick returner was in critical condition, and “the Beast” had been proclaimed dead. He had hit so hard that his neck had snapped, killing him instantly.
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“The Beast” charged down field, his eyes locked on the object—the kick returner. He lowered his head and plowed into the the player. Instantly everything went black.
A loud roaring and booming sound filled his ears. He opened his eyes. He was back as a minotaur. Trees crashed all around him, and the thunder boomed in his ears as he lay there. Just then another minotaur ran up.
“What are we to do?” he asked, panicked.
“We're gonna--” Grunwick’s answer was cut short as the ground opened underneath the minotaur, swallowing him. Grunwick caught a glimpse of the flames of hell, be fore the chasm closed again.
Better round up the others, he thought. He had barely taken three steps when he heard the ground opening up again. He looked behind him and saw that he was right on the edge of an ever-widening chasm. He ran blindly ahead through the forest with the chasm right on his heels all the time. He didn't see the branch till it was to late. He was caught up long enough for the ground to disappear beneath him. Then he fell, screaming, in to hell.
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Within five minutes, the chasm had stretched to the utmost part of Marteldom, destroying everything in its path. Six minutes later, Marteldom was no longer a quiet peaceful country filled with the noise of birds and deer. Now it was a gaping lake of fire in a bottomless chasm, that was filled with all sorts of demonic noises and the spine-tingling screams of the lost souls in hell.
Suddenly the air was filled with bright lights whizzing at a great speed towards the lake of fire. An ever-growing patch of black sky appeared as the stars rained down. After the stars came the planets, landing with great sprays of flame. Finally the sun itself came thundering down. After the sun disappeared, there was about ten seconds of the most awful noises, during which the chasm strained, as if trying to break into the next world. Suddenly there was a great roar followed by a loud boom, that echoed for twenty minutes. In the following silence, the chasm closed, leaving a dark bare stone in a jet black world.
Following the jet black silence, a voice like thunder came from heaven. “When once man returns to this land, it shall be restored and joined with Peruna.” Then silence returned.
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Zebulon sat at his table, drinking his usual cup of coffee before he went out to start the day. He had the feeling that something was wrong. He couldn't put his finger on it, but he felt uneasy this morning. Well, ever since the humans had drawn back about four and a half, five months ago, he had been uneasy. What made it worse was that Garth was still lost and Skylar was getting gloomier each day.
He raised his eyes from the coffee cup to the Southern Hills. Something was wrong about those mist enshrouded hills today. They seemed darker. That was it! The hills! He couldn't see them today. In their place was a boiling, threatening black mass of...something or other.
How could that be? He thought to himself. They couldn't have just disappeared overnight—that's impossible. But there's the proof. Last evening, they were there, this morning they're gone.
I'm gonna find out what happened to them, if it's the last thing I do, he thought to himself decidedly as he washed his breakfast dishes. Then he went into his bedroom, put on his armor and strapped on his three swords. Then he set off.
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Skandar, Garth, and Fletcher were talking about the fighting that they guessed was still going on in Peruna.
Fletcher joked, “Ya ever hear that sports is kind of like war without the killing?”
Garth snapped his fingers! “That's it!” he cried, jumping off Fletcher's bed. Fletcher jumped.
“What's it?” asked Skandar.
“Just what Fletcher said, if we could get back to Peruna, I have an idea on how to just crush the humans.”
“How?” asked Fletcher and Skandar asked simultaneously.
“You remember that play you did last Friday? The...what do you call it? Blitz?”
“Yeah.”
“That would be perfect for catching them off guard. We send one-third of our soldiers to meet the enemy head on. We split up the one remaining one-third in half and hack away at the edges till we break through and-as you say-sack their quarterback, which in this case would be their reserve troops. The last one-third, we'd keep in the backfield to guard against any would be surprise attacks to the back.”
“That's brilliant!” cried Skandar, leaping from the bed. “Then all you have to do is deal a couple of hard knocks and they're done for. What think, Fletch?” He turned to Fletcher.
“That would be good, but...”
“But what?” asked Skandar, “it's a brilliant plan.”
“I was going to say that it would be a good strategy except that it takes lots of hard work and practice to be able to do it at precisely the same time. The two side attackers have to hit hard and fast at the same time, and the front attackers would have to be on their toes-or hoofs-to keep the guys they're fighting distracted from what's going on at the edges.”
“What else?”
“Also when the side attackers are attacking, they have to try to get through at the same time. Then-in football teams-they have to put pressure on the quarterback and not give him a chance to throw the ball, which in this case would mean, the reserves going and helping the others in their fighting.”
“I see,” said Garth, “but I still think we could do it. But for right now, let's hit the sack.”
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After pushing hard all day, Zeb now stood within sword's reach of the black boiling something or other. He looked to either side and behind him, drew one of his short swords, took a deep breath, ad stepped in. Instant blackness swallowed him. He couldn't see anything. He looked behind him, where he supposed he should be able to see at least a grayness, but nope. Just black. He stepped back one step, where he should've been outside the blackness, but nothing happened. It was then that he realized that he couldn't get back. He was stuck for good.
Just then an eerie humming filled the air, that sent the chills up and down his spine. He gripped his sword tighter than he'd ever done in any battle. Suddenly, a faint glowing light appeared before him. He hesitantly stepped forward towards it. Just as he'd reached it, a voice that seemed to come from all directions said, “Touch it. You know you want to.” As if in a trance, he reached out. Just as he touched it, spine tingling laughter sounded. Like the voice, it seemed to come from everywhere at once. He tried pulling away, but found that he couldn't. Suddenly, he saw faint wisps of smoke slip out of a crack that had opened in the light. As he watched, it took shape just barely out of the light and ran off into the darkness.
What he saw chilled him to the bone. Ogres, minotaurs, boggles, specters, hags, witches, werewolves, ravens, and huge wolves, just to name a few of all the horrible, completely evil creatures he saw come out of the light that he had somehow seemed to have unlocked.
All the while, the eerie humming was going on. He finally realized that the humming was emitting from the light.
He struggled harder and harder to free himself. Finally, he gave up and fell on his knees. “God help me!” he screamed in anguish.
Suddenly his hand dropped lose and immediately another voice like the first one, except bigger, far more powerful, and filled with tender love said, “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness.”
The spot of light quickly shrank from view, getting smaller and smaller, until it completely vanished, leaving the world in total darkness again. He went on through the darkness, going slowly. Suddenly he bumped against something kind of soft that had what felt like horsehide. He slowly bent over and felt it, running his hands along it. A quick examination revealed that it was a centaur—dead. He walked on and bumped into another one, then another, and another.
Strange, he thought to himself. After bumping into more dead bodies, he finally stopped. How do I know that I'm not just walking in circles? He sat down and decided to review what he knew about this “Shadow-land”.
The last battle against the minotaurs had happened on this side of the mountains, if he remembered correctly. He could picture his grandfather telling him the story, that he'd gotten from his grandfather who'd fought as a head general under command of Garnock I...
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“General!” Garnock the First glanced over and saw his first-in-command general, Zebulon, coming towards him, sword drawn, dripping with blood.
“What?” he asked. He'd just pulled back for a breather.
“The left wing has just collapsed. The minotaurs are too strong in that part. We need more troops,” Zebulon shouted over the roar of battle.
“We don't have any more troops to spare. They're already stretched too thin on the right wing. The one thousand troops I sent around to the back must've got lost somewhere. They haven't attacked yet. Another quarter hour and we'll be too far gone for an attack from behind to help us any.”
Fifteen minutes passed and no sign of the one thousand troops. Garnock put his horn to his lips and blew the signal to retreat. An hour later they were all assembled on the