#mind wars

[all-action-all-picture]

Starlord No. 18, dated 9 September 1978. Mind Wars cover by Bob Wakelin.

Rebellion.

[ghostsymphony]

Polifex is ringed by hundreds of orbitals and space stations. It boasts an armada of more than fifteen-hundred ships divided into three battle-groups; spheres of defense that ring my world in unnatural lights that form then into overlapping fields of killing light and fire. Each cluster of orbitals are defended by dozens of gun platforms that are in turn shielded by generators and the squadrons of fighters that then protect their matrices from being destroyed. Void-hardened infantry man the space-stations, watching, waiting, alert for any sign of threat that lurks in the stars. The world below them turns slowly, its cities slowly becoming the metropolis it once was. Once was. Before our time, before the darkness came to here and the shadow of dark things swarmed this place. Perhaps it is a forgotten story. I come to this world not as its defender now but as its murderer. A fleet five thousand strong forms into a spear, the tip of which I am not for that is where I know He will be. He is always going to be where the fighting is thickest. Deception is not my choice but now out of necessity. I need to do this because it is the only thing that matters. Survival is not enough. Striking hard and aiming low is my only chance for success. Five thousand may seem like a legion but in truth if we were to take on Polifex’s aerial defenses piece by piece we would struggle to destroy even a third of its total sphere. This isn’t about capture, this is about assassination. A lance strike aimed at the heart, the spear will not survive not its point but all that matters is its cargo. I am not here to fight the war of attrition only to reach my target and slay them. 

[run-the-night]

[all-action-all-picture]

Starlord No. 11, dated 22 July 1978. Mind Wars cover by Bob Wakelin. I wonder if the cover image might have been based on Caroline Munro? Also shown is an ad for the following issue.

Rebellion.

[all-action-all-picture]

Starlord No. 2, dated 20 May 1978. Timequake cover by Brian Bolland. Below is an ad for the issue that had appeared in the first issue of Starlord.

I can remember getting this issue (I missed out on the first one) and then going to my Uncle's house and showing off the extremely useful item that was the Space Calculator.

Rebellion.

[all-action-all-picture]

Ad for Starlord No. 7, out 19 June 1978. Artwork by Jesus Redondo (Mind Wars) and Ian Gibson (Starlord). Rebellion.

[ghostsymphony]

Ibe falls beneath me, and the cheer I hear is one of the most satisfying sounds I have heard in the passing days. Lucas battles Damien while David fights Bale, and for the moment, I do not wish to steal either of their glory. Heavy footfalls interrupt my thoughts, and as I survey the battle I see who has lost his patience. He moves ponderously slow passed the center, and though he is some way off, all of us can see him as he rises out of the scrum like a tidal wave threatening to crush us all. He is not coming for me, I realize too late as he barrels into his own slaves before crunching into our right flank as if there was nothing there at all. “Sarah!” I cry out, sprinting through the melee, trapped between bodies of friend and foe alike. I cannot reach her. I see her beneath his meaty hands, her flail embedded in his shoulder and her spear unable to find purchase in his cheek. Her cries of agony can be heard even from here and panic wells within me, giving strength of my limbs as I tear through the melee to get to her. He Who Waits tears at her wings, plucking them from her back as if they were not bones and ligaments part of her body, the sound something many stop and watch, horrified at the torment on display. The third company mill at the monster’s feet, stabbing at its ankles, slashing at its legs. Spears being thrown at its face while mailed fists punch in futility at its pudgy flesh. It sees me charging through the melee towards it, each leap taking me closer toward it. It locks eyes with me and I know then that this scene of unimaginable cruelty is for me, and me alone. It’s hand encloses around her head. “No!” I cry, hurtling myself into its side, as it drops the broken body of the Arch-Angel of Truth, her crumpled remains all that is left of her as the right flank begins to crumble underneath the Anti-Light assault. I am carving a bloody ruin into the mountain of flesh, each of my cuts creating great fissures that burn and incinerate its arms. And all it does, through the pain I am causing it is laugh. Tears spill down my face as I drive it back, spilling down my chin to drip down my body beneath my battered plate. This is too much. It is too much.

[ghostsymphony]

I see him pressing his hand to the gate. I feel what he feels and know what troubles him. For now, I have no consoling words or comfort to give. My chest feels constricted, as if a hand has reached into me and is clenching around the very core of my being. It is not unkind, but the feeling is the noose around all our necks. I can see the armies behind that door, He Who Waits, patiently awaiting the fall of this meager defense only built to buy time and nothing more. Time for our souls, for our lives to grind out one more day of life before being snuffed out. And our efforts rest on my brother, who still feels pain, agony, sadness even after four months of death and galling defeat. He may not feel it but I am proud of such a feat. To not be dulled by so much misery. It is a gift that he sees as a curse. Nothing I say will convince him otherwise.  I watch him now with a mixture of emotions I have not felt in some time. Perhaps it is fatigue or, being so close to the end, a parting gift to me. The feeling is alien and registers only as the fear of one’s work will never reach accomplishment before the end. We have done all we can to save this world barring one, and that choice will be his to make. I look at my brother his head bowed still with one hand to the gate. Conflicted feelings roar through his mind, a hurricane of simulations and battle schemata probing for weaknesses and ways to defeat the coming storm. There are none.  This is the culmination of four hundred years of survival. I know we will not survive another week. They have beaten us back to the inner keep, the last ring of defenses a series of chokepoints that will bleed our enemies and us until there is no one left to hold them.  John will face him at the end and we will stand at his side to fight in the last battle. I cannot say our eternity here has been a blessing for ageless life has left an exhaustion no words can fathom. I look forward to the coming engagement. And I look forward to sleep. Though I must suffer to reach such peace I know John, like myself, will pay it gladly.