In my desire to write a decent story for the Lunatics I came up with this and but I could never get past the first scene. As the story develops -- or as it did so in my head when I thought of it -- Vultureman creates a large machine shaped like a small hut or cottage. One by one the Thundercats are lured into innocent-looking structure and the machine traps them, brining to life all their worst nightmares.

"Vultureman's Latest Invention"

By RD Rivero

August 19, 2000

"Time and time again we've fought the Thundercats and always, always we've been defeated," Luna began. Her head angled down to the top of Amuk's head -- she paused, she sighed -- she looked up at the others. "Amuk, TugMug, Red-Eye, Alluro, Chilla -- and yet the whole of us can't defeat those wretched Thundercats."

"I don't understand it, Luna," Chilla stepped out of the ring of Lunatics that surrounded their leader. "We've come close to destroying them, but --"

"Maybe we're going about this the wrong way."

"What do you mean, Alluro?" Luna turned to her right, her face angled, her eyes wide open to him.

"We can't defeat them head-to-head, so let's try a different tactic, a sneakier tactic."

"Explain!"

"I think I understand," Chilla spoke, "guerilla warfare."

"Yes. No mercy, no prisoners. When we capture them we shouldn't bring them to Sky Tomb, where they could cause damage, we should kill them on the spot. We shouldn't go after them outright, we shouldn't try to invade Cat's Lair -- it's suicide -- rather, we should take them out one at a time, in places far, distant, from help, from the others."

TugMug gave his two cents worth: "Why go after the Thundercats? Why not the Warrior Maidens, the Wollos, the Berbils, the ones who don't fight back."

The others burst into laughter then Luna spoke: "No, first we must get rid of the Thundercats, then we can concentrate on the others."

"And to get rid of the Thundercats --" Alluro began.

"Means we'll have to get rid of Liono and that blasted Sword of Omens," Chilla concluded.

Following the 'documentary' Observing Thunderians in the Wild I had the idea of extending the concept to include planet Thundera (and its system) as well. This 'chapter' would have served as an introduction. It is technical and most of it will be unintelligible to those unfamiliar with astronomical jargon. Frankly, astronomy was never my favorite branch of physics -- something I blame on the professor -- and I think that's why I never went on with this.

"Planet Thundera"

By RD Rivero

August 20, 2000

The star system HB309Y is located in one of the more remote corners of the galaxy 8.31 pc from the terrestrial sun. Currently, in the year 47011, the central star is found in a dense region of the southwestern spiral arm. The star revolves around the galactic center with an average tangential velocity of 18 km/s.

HB309Y is a G-class star with a mass of 1.21 SMU. Its color is a faint, off-yellow and is very bright. Its surface temperature is a steady 5000 K. The size is 900 million kilometers in radius and the luminosity has been measured at 4.0x10^26 Watts. The estimated ages of the star and of the surrounding planets are in the order of 3 billion years.

Upon closer inspection, around 200 AU from the star system center, we see that HB309Y is in fact a binary system. The other 'star' is a very small brown dwarf (bd) with a mass of 400 EMU. The bd revolves around the larger star much like the planets and for all intensive purposes we can regard it as a planet.

The solar system contains six planets (excluding the bd). Only the inner two are terrestrial, the remaining are gas giants of staggering size. Beyond the range of the planets is a thick section of asteroids spread in a uniform spherical shell. Past the asteroids we will find nothing for 2.11 pc when we at last read the outer boundaries of the Altarian star system.

Table #001

Name Mass[EMU] Radial[AU] Period Moons

Sol HB309Y 3859 - - -

bd HB309Ybd 400 0.01 8.2 hrs -

1T Prethundera 0.01 0.47 ~110 dys 0

2T Thundera 1.05 0.75 ~222 dys 0

1G Hydros 318 9.21 26.1 yrs 25

2G Helios 94 19.00 77.4 yrs 30

3G Lithios-1 90 29.55 150 yrs ~20

4G Lithios-2 75 36.71 208 yrs 3

Ast ~2.33 50-150 - -

1T or HB309Y1T is named Prethundera. This small planet is in many ways similar to Mercury in appearance and composition. The surface is rocky and jagged and bears the scars of a billion craters scattered completely in random. The largest impact crater measures five hundred miles in diameter and is nearly two hundred feet deep into the planet. Large sections of mantel are exposed along the rim. The violent explosion caused the loss of most of the atmosphere by igniting and consuming the gasses in the fireballs that engulfed the planet.

Geologically, Prethundera consists of nickel and iron. Deposits of silicon and carbon-containing compounds are found in large, sprawling caverns many miles beneath the surface. (The caverns within the planet are expansive and interconnected. To date barely 1% of this planet-wide system has been explored.) Other elements appear in trace amounts only.

The core is frozen and as a result the planet exhibits no magnetic field. The period of axial rotation is around 300 earth days. The axis itself is not tilted substantially from the normal. The planet's orbit lies 2 to 3 degrees off of the plane of the ecliptic and the path is altered periodically in accordance with general relativity. No moon orbits Prethundera.

Hydros or HB309Y1G is the largest of the natural planets. Unlike Prethundera, Hydros contains vast amounts of nonmetallic elements. The atmosphere is divided into three zones, each zone having a characteristic density that remains constant throughout. The upper zone consists of hydrogen and helium exclusively and remains invisible to the naked eye. The zone is thin, extending no more than 5000 km into the planet. This zone is particularly stable but hot to about 3000 K. The middle zone is by far the largest and contains the bulk of the planet's mass. Methane and ammonia are the most common compounds found here but other organic compounds appear along vertical zones oriented about the equator. The middle zone is colder, 1000 to 4000 K and is marked by violent storms and atmospheric upheavals. It is speculated that only the most primitive life forms can exist in this environment. The last layer of gas forms the core which is about twice the volume of the earth. Metallic hydrogen and solid helium are found here fused together under the enormous pressures. The core rotates once every two seconds and is responsible for the incredibly powerful magnetic field Hydros exudes. The planet itself takes 15 hours to rotate about its central axis.

In appearance Hydros is blue. It has no rings or ring systems. The moons revolve around the planets equator and are evenly spaced. The moons are named in the order that they appear. The vast majority of them are in the scale of asteroids, mostly because the planet tends to draw foreign entities toward itself, thus saving the internal terrestrial from much damage. Only three moons are large enough to see with a telescope. HB309Y1G-M15, M18 and M19. The closest to Hydros is volcanic and quite active. It is a hostile environment due mostly to the fact that the moon is being ripped apart by the great mass of Hydros. The other two moons are icy and are dead geologically. Curiously, HB309Y1G-M18 has a dense atmosphere contained organic compounds of various degrees of complexity. Because the moon was so cold and because of the immense radiation from Hydros's magnetic field, life was not allowed to evolve beyond the molecular level.

Hydros is not tilted and its orbit lies within the plane of the ecliptic. Its orbital period of 26 years corresponds to the central star's sunspot cycle. The planet also radiates more energy that it absorbs.

This one I know will never be finished. While I thought about it some more I realized I could tell the same story a better way and that's when I came up with Mwahahahaha.

"The Long Good Night"

By RD Rivero

May 12, 2000

Tygra and Panthro were out in the mountains to find mines and ores of fuel. Cheetara and Liono were visiting the Wolos on the other side of the continent for the next few weeks. Snarf was asleep in his room in the depths of Cat's Lair. For the most part WileyKat and WileyKit were alone, so alone, so utterly alone. Dinner had been eaten several hours before, the sun had set and all the world was basked in the darkness of night. The clouds were thick in the northern sky only, the rest of the heavens was ablaze in the sparkling of untold, unnumbered sparks. The moon's electric and eerie eye was missing, oddly, it was no where to be seen.

In the control room the twins were on the floor, playing a round of some ancient, first earth board game. It was WileyKit's turn, she rolled the dice, he moved her token -- a shiny, metal top-hat -- the whole five spaces forward. She was very careful to watch him, she had been unusually suspicious about him.

"That's two hundred dollars, Kit," he said.

She rolled her eyes back then thumbed out some of her multicolored bills. "Here, you greedy little mutant!"

"Oh, stop, you're just jealous that I'm winning."

"Cheating, more like it."

He shook his head but said nothing. He rolled the dice and right when the two, little cubes hit the floor the two heard a slight tap come from elsewhere. Actually, WileyKit noticed the sound more than her brother had. She turned her head around to face the open door of the control room. Outside, the hall was light brightly from the fluorescent ceiling fixtures. She looked back suddenly to see that her brother had just then at that instant, at that moment turned one of the dice around from the 'three' to the 'one' side.

"Why you little --"

He looked up at her, stunned, silent. He was about to say something but then the tap returned. The two looked back to the open door -- the lights behind had been extinguished.

"It's just Snarf. He's --"

Don't worry about the tittle, I was just looking for a story to begin with 'Q' that most elusive letter. This one would have been very creepy had I finished it but so much time has passed that, alas, I forgot what I was aiming for. Oh well. Much of it remains unedited.

"Quantum Dynamics"

By RD Rivero

May 31, 2000

Outside the Tower of Omens WileyKat and WileyKit played hide-and-seek in the moderately dense fields. It was noonday but the sun was marred and obscured by a dense layer of fog that had formed all morning and had then, only then, the marked appearance of gray-blackness that usually indicated the oncoming storm. The two realized that their time for play would be cut short by the whim of Nature so they tried their best to enjoy the few remaining moments of tranquil idleness. WileyKat stood before a tall, wide willow tree, his face was pressed up against the brittle bark, his left arm was across his face to cover his eyes. While he counted and moved around the tree little bits and snippets of bark fell onto the ground and roots beneath were hoards of ants roamed and foraged through the forest floor. The air was calm and cool and scented in most pristine flowery aromas of the open buds that bloomed from the stringy, hairy branches that hung downwards around him.

"Eight," he said, louder than usual, "nine, ten -- I'm going to get you WileyKit." He turned away from the tree then walked out from under the hanging canopy that swayed in the gentlest breeze. He looked in all directly and for the moment was bewildered by the size of it all. He heard a giggle but paid it no attention -- by then he knew his sister's bag of tricks forward and backward. He looked down to the ground that was covered in leaves and broken branches. Every so often a green shoot of newly hatched plants broke from the crunchy underbrush but that was all. The forest was silent while he roamed and wandered. The boy kept his eyes upwards for he had the strangest notion that the girl was up in a tree hiding -- cheating for she knew the rules better than he. "Wait," he whispered to himself -- of course, she had written the rules, hadn't see? The tower was always in sight and as long as he could see it he felt he was safe to roam as he pleased. He stumbled upon a strange area of land were thin rocks shot up from earth. The rocks were arranged in rows and there were no more than five for each line. The land there had cleared from trees but the wild plants were nearly two feet high, high enough almost to enshroud the rocks -- high enough to cover a cowering WileyKit, too, he wondered. He took a few steps inward -- his feet his something crunchy and he panicked for a moment. Beneath the swaying mass of vegetation was a framework of twigs and dried leaves arranged almost in the form of a net. He was worried that he had stumbled onto a trap and that worse, that his sister may have been ensnared in it as well but he heard no cries for help and the meshwork seemed harmless enough. Actually, the part that he didn't like the most were the dense plants for they had a strange, colorless flower that itched when ever in came in contact with his fur. He wondered indeed if his sister could possibly be there in that mess but then realized that to win she would do just about anything. That meant that he would have to do just about everything. So he fought off the irritation and trekked further into the small clearing. Medium sized trees surrounded that patch of land but there was no other life. A strong breeze blew strong and ruffled violently the vegetation -- he felt the slightest hints of water droplets on his skin and that was followed by a singular and prolonged cold chill that made him shiver. "WileyKit I know you're in there," he shouted. He moved closer and passed the first two rows of rocks. To make sure there was no one between them he walked through them through their complete lengths. He noticed that each succeeding row was deeper -- especially at the center. He began to worry that he had mistaken himself, that his sister was not there until at last he reached the final row. It was so suddenly deep that he slid and fell into a dark pit. He looked up -- sunshine for the first time that day managed to break through the clouds and seep through the plants that covered the open hole of the pit. The place was oddly square-shaped, the walls, though covered in vines and dirt, if dug through an inch or two revealed a wall of blue tiles. The floor, two had that curious property except that he had uncovered concrete, broken and shattered, oxidized red from the ages. He found his sister, too, she was crouched on to one of the walls, her ear pressed firmly upon it. She had been very quiet but had noticed him. She motioned him to silence and he tried to listen in too. That wall was different -- there were no tiles, rather it was a firm metal, a door but there seemed to be no way to open it. He heard nothing then she began to whisper.

"When I stumbled upon it the sound was much louder -- it was a pounding, a strong, violent pounding. Even the wall shook and I could feel the vibration. It began the moment I fell into this pit. The pounding ceased but was followed by something that I think was speech."

"You heard voices? What did they say?"

"I don't know but the tone wasn't very nice."

Another strong gust of air blew from above. The sparse plant cover opened up temporality the fell back down again. Some young plants followed and entangled in their manes.

"I think there's people in there."

"That's crazy. You don't know it their criminals incarcerated trying to escape. No, WileyKit, it's not safe to be here and do this. Lets get back to the tower. I think it's going to rain soon."

His sister shook her fists into the air and he darted back a moment.

"Fine!"

The two began the arduous task of climbing out of the pit. Although the rim was not more than four feet above their heads the walls did not help their climb for the soil was far, far too loose and the plants were young and broke pitifully in their hands. After they had gotten a grip, though, they managed to free themselves with some ease. Back in the tower the two were covered in rashes. Pumyra was beside herself.

"Where have you two been doing? Wallowing in poison ivy?"

"It doesn't hurt that much," WileyKat said while he scratched his hands.

Pumyra took his hands into her own to examine them: "You've scratched off your fur!"

"That's enough, no more unsupervised excursions for you to," Bengali put his two cents in.

"But we were just having fun--"

"Stop scratching your eyes, WileyKit, you'll only make it worse!" She took the twins into one of the bathrooms and made them strip much to their collective embarrassments. She began with WileyKit for she had been in the weeds longer then she worked on her brother. She covered them with a special lotion to keep the itching down and then doused their eyes so that they would not scratch them any longer.

"It's just not fair," the girl kept saying, "we never get to have any fun!" The two were led to their room stark naked for even their clothes had to be decontaminated and there they waited until dinner to come out. In the meanwhile they had conspired not to tell them about what they had discovered. It began to rain heavily and thundered while the four ate in the darkened mess hall. The rectangular table had been covered in a heavy, brown cloth. Unfrilled plates and glasses had been set by Bengali along with utensils. Pumyra served the dinner. The Thundercats ate in silence interrupted only by the sounds of scratching from the kittens. When it was over and it was time for bed Bengali got to them and hugged them both at once, one twin in each arm.

"I know it seems mean but --" he petted their manes slightly.

"But we love you," Pumyra continued. "Now you'll need more lotion before you go to bed."

Who's Line Is It Anyway is one of my favorite shows, hell, I even watch the old British version and like it. Their 'newscast' game is one of the best and that was the inspiration for this. Had it gone one we would have seen interviews with Grune -- Jagga's rejected lover -- and Mumm-Ra.

"Jagga -- A Documentary"

By RD Rivero

May 25, 2000

[Fade in. Cue theme music. A television newsroom. Two anchors prepare for the broadcast.]

Bush: Hello and good evening. My name is GW Bush.

Gore: And I am A Gore. This is the eleven o'clock news.

Bush: [Looking to the side toward another camera.] The headlines tonight. A man hijacks a freighter full of clam juice, terrorists attempt to bomb the sight of upcoming Olympics and the Cartoon Network once again pulls the plug on the Thundercats.

Gore: [Off camera.] Those -- [Deleted. The camera pans to him.] Oh, um, speaking of which is the first item on the list for tonight. Jeraldo Upchuck has brought us an exclusive report on Jagga, the much beloved, benign figure. [A picture of Jagga appears on a small box just over his head.] Or is he? [The picture of Jagga transforms in a snarling, teeth-bearing, sword-wheelding maniac.]

Bush: [The camera is on both anchors.] With more on this touchy subject now here is Jeraldo Upchuck.

[Cut to Jeraldo Upchuck in a small, darkened room. A single bright spotlight falls upon him. Barely out of the camera's sight is an enshadowed figure.]

If you've never read Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus you don't know what you're missing. It was the first play of his that I read on my own, the fact that it's a horror play may also be a reason why I like it. At the end of the play there's a banquet scene where a woman eats her own children -- without her knowledge, of course. I had that cannibalistic idea in mind when I was writing this but, for one reason or another, I just couldn't finish it. I wrote so much, though, that I couldn't just throw it away. I used the death scenes of Snarfer and WileyKat in a couple of other stories that I did complete.

"Come To The Party"

By RD Rivero

April 28, 2000

"Do I have a life, my pet?" Mumm-Ra peered down to the floor, to the dark floor but Ma-Mut was no where to be seen. "Oh, I was once a man." The mummy arose from the chair, his bones rattled and groaned. He clenched his hands lightly and the sounds of his fingers cracking actually surprised him. "No, I don't have a life, no body likes me, no body wants to be my friend --" he felt something brush-up against the back of his leg, he picked-up the bandaged, gray dog, "except for you, of course."

He sighed, he carried the small animal in his folded arms while he walked out of the chamber into the wide, interior hall. The passage was lined on either side by tall columns of red marble that shimmered in the roaring torch light. The ceiling above was adorned by slabs of rocks sandwiched between dark, Lebanon cedars. The floor below was a cobblestone hotchpotch of flat, interlocking pieces of shale.

'I feel bored today, I'm exhausted and I don't know why, my pet, I don't know why."

The hallway ended in a vast upper chamber. In the center of that new room was a rectangular pool. Water fell and sprayed down from a circular opening in the ceiling, from which an eerie blue light evolved. The water was clear, crystal clear, not stagnant and there appeared to be fish of some sort swimming within. Along the edges, overgrown, green, leafy plants spread out across the rippled surface.

The stone walls were adorned with carved and engraved idols of Isis, Osiris, Ammon-Ra and at the far corner, amidst large, porcelain vases of grain. Clumped in small groups of three or four around the room were pots of lotuses, roses, carnations, jasmine and other fragrant flowers. The up-sloped parts of the ceiling had large, rectangular windows that let in droplets of rainwater, clasps of thunder, bolts of lighting and views of clouds and of black sky.

He put the dog down on the floor and then walked closer to the pool while he talked. "I'll have fun my own way -- yes! They'll see, I'll show them all. But how to do it? But how to do it, my pet?" He materialized a small bowl of bread crumbs in his hands and began to throw the little, cubed pieces into the water. The croutons were soaked and sunk beneath where the fish ate heartily. "Ha ha ha, ha ha ha! I'll throw a party. I'll throw a party. Oh, I have to get everything ready! It must be perfect."

Somewhere in the clear distance, in the forests that surrounded the looming, the oppressively looming head of Cat's Lair, Snarf and the kittens were furrowing through the shrubs and the bushes. The day, by contrast, was bright, the skies were blue. Small droplets of clouds would appear only to dissolve into a faint mist within minutes. The air was calm and still, fragranced with the aroma of the dew that collected even then in the flowers and in the fragile leaves of newly bloomed trees.

Silence was everywhere until the twins came into view from the shade of the dense parts of the jungle. She had carried a brown basket in her hands, he had knapsack over his back. In the grassy clearing the two put down the loads and began to talk about absolute nonsense.

"I didn't want to go to the Tower last week 'cause Pumyra was there and, well, you know how she is."

"After the incident with the bird!" He laughed. "So what does she do now that Bengali and --"

A twig broke in the bushes behind them. The two stopped for a moment and looked behind. Satisfied that they are alone and that Snarf was not listening in they continued.

She reached out and grabbed his head closer to hers to whisper into his ear: "Snarfer told me --"

"Snarfer?"

"Sh! Snarfer works late in the lab, he hears them arguing. Any ways, he told me that Bengali once told Pumyra while, you know, while they were --"

The bushes ruffled and a cloud of purple smoke burst forth into the air that only then circulated in an icy cold breeze. The event happened so quickly that the kittens had no time to react, they had no time to hold their breaths for they had been too busy talking. WileyKat and WileyKit collapsed into each other's arms and bounced on the ground in a deep sleep.

Only then did Snarf appear. He stumbled upon the surreal scene and stepped aback in horror. Before he could utter a word one of the candy fruit bushes shook violently and parted and out of the ground Mumm-Ra sprung into view.

"Master," Snarf said, he fell to the ground on his knees prostrate.

"I had to get them out of the way, but don't worry, as soon as I'm done here they'll awaken." He smiled wickedly. "I have something in store for them soon enough."

"What is your will, my Master? Snarf. Snarf." He swayed up and down, his arms flailed in the air in perverse ecstasy.

"We have an understanding that I am more than pleased with but your nephew I do not trust." He leaned in closer, his red eyes twinkled merely at the thought. "Kill him. Kill him without a trace. Kill him."

"Won't the others notice his absence?"

"Leave the others to me, Snarf and do not fail."

"I never do, my Master. Snarf. Snarf."

The basement of the Tower of Omens. Dark, though along the tops of the walls were short, rectangular windows. Cold, though it was the middle of July. Damp, though the air elsewhere everywhere was dry, desert dry. Marked and unmarked boxes of a thin, yellow wood along with crates whose lids were nailed or screwed down, full of refuse, cluttered the interior in various groupings.

The air was scented with the distinct odor of ash and of sawdust.

The doorknob twisted quickly until the click sounded. The wooden door then creaked open in a loud and in a penetrative groan. The top hinges were so dire in need of oil that the metal part snapped in a puff of thick, red rust. The door came to rest before the inner wall at an odd angle until the bottom hinges broke, too and then wooden door fell to floor with a loud clang. Dust flew up in the air in a gray cloud.

"Bengali won't like it at all," Snarfer's voice echoed in the room before he came into view. "He'll be very upset."

Snarf entered right behind.

"The box."

"Yes, of course, I think the kittens put it somewhere around the corner."

"Go check. Snarf. Snarf."

"Are you feeling all right, uncle?"

Snarf turned to face his nephew. "There's no time to chitchat."

"OK." He roamed through the maze of crates into the shadows.

The older snarf wandered, too. He stumbled upon a large, green machine, heavy and metallic. The saw dust smell was the worst from it and around it were mounds of shredded wood.

"What's this for?" he asked his nephew.

"It's an electrical saw. It's too heavy to move so Bengali just left it down here."

Snarf switched on a small lamp that had been placed on a table nearby. He explored the machine and he discovered that it was plugged in. Upon further inspection he realized that the cutting device itself consisted of a single, thin jagged strip of metal that was circulated continuously through a well-guarded housing.

Another little light bulb lit, too, in his head.

While his nephew rummaged through half-open crates, Snarf unsnapped the armored housings to expose the metal saw parts within. Suddenly Snarfer emerged empty handed.

"No, maybe it's in Cat's Lair. Uncle, what are you doing?"

There was no answer, there was no needed for an answer. Snarf stepped to the side at the same time he turned on the electrical saw. The jagged strip of metal ran, turned through the gigantic wheels of the machine. The saw part began slide from the holding apparatus until at last it was free entirely. To his delight the plan worked to perfection. The rotating metal blade bounced onto the floor and, still rotating, wobbled its way to the unsuspecting Snarfer. All in all the incident took no more than a few seconds and after a loud shriek it was over.

The saw struck him first in the nose -- his mouth was open screaming -- the muzzle itself was shattered and flew into the air in about three pieces. The blade made a slight turn while it continued to embed itself into the victim. It struck through one of the eyeball which then proceeded to rupture in a burst of clear liquid mixed with shredded cornea and iris.

By that time the saw was well into the skull where it split the bones clearly in half from the upper right ear to the lower left side where the jaw had once been. Blood and brain matter squirted into the air. The neck was also severed diagonally which, of course, caused part of the head to fall onto the floor where it broke apart like an egg.

The saw was not done, yet, the torso from the waist up was sliced in half. Entrails and internal organ flopped down to the floor along with the rest of the shredded body. Oddly, the heart continued to beat for a while, those parts of the heart that were not sliced, diced and spewed on the floor. Blood squirted in small pools in ever shortening vigor. And then at last it was over. Fortunately the sounds from the metal saw deafened the what had just happened.

Snarf turned off the machine. He immediately began to clean up the mess. First the saw blade. When it finally stopped moving and with the aid of a pair of pliers he snipped it into smaller sections and then stowed those little pieces away in a fresh, new crate. He refastened those parts of the saw that he had removed as well as turned off the lamp.

The body was a little more difficult but fortunately he always kept garbage bags nearby. He stuffed one half of the corpse in one bag and another in a second bag. He opened a third bag and in all three he dumped the spare and miscellaneous contents of boxes and of crates and he even cleaned up the piles of saw dust and broken, chipped wood. All three bags weighed the same, all three bags looked about the same. Yes, he was satisfied no one would ever suspect. He dragged the three heavy loads to the open door then returned to the scene of the crime. Blood was on the floor but he could not just clean that sort of thing up without arousing too much suspicion. He dragged some of the crates over and around the small, puddles of blood.

"Snarf?" a male voice asked from behind.

"Bengali?" Snarf growled. "You scared me."

"What's going on down here?"

"Oh, nothing, I, um, I did some cleaning."

He paused for a moment then asked: "Have you seen Snarfer?"

"No. There was no one here when I arrived. Snarf. Snarf"

"That's unusual. Well, I though I heard a scream."

"That was me," Snarf had become more relaxed," Snarf. Snarf. When the door broke free from its hinges."

The white tiger looked to his left and darted aback.

"I hope you're not angry."

He shook his head: "No, no, I'm sorry, that was my fault, I knew I should have oiled it but I kept putting it off."

"Could you help me take these bags out to the dump?"

"Sure, I'll do it, don't worry about it." He picked up two of the bags in one hand and draped a third over his back. He turned into the hall and stopped. "Snarfer! You have a lot of explaining to do."

"Oh, do I?"

"We have to talk about something when I get back, OK?"

Bengali left without saying more.

"Master?" Snarf asked.

"And you doubted my powers?"

"Snarf. Snarf."

"We're going to have a party, Snarf, in the Tower of Omens. Go back to Cat's Lair and tell the others, then return with the kittens. Tell them that we need WileyKat and WileyKit to help us for the party."

"I understand."

"I know you do, my loyal apprentice. When Bengali returns I'll tell him that he and Pumyra should go to Cat's Lair until we have finished with our preparations."

"As you will, my Master. Snarf. Snarf."

Several hours passed and it was already noon. The tower was quiet and empty, empty except for Snarfer. In the comfort of anonymity he had transformed the kitchen. The front door opened and that was immediately followed by the voices of the Thunder kittens. The two seemed excited about the party but were curious about why the news of it had come so suddenly, so unexpectedly.

"Hey, what happened here?" WileyKat asked.

"I did some redecorating," Snarfer replied.

"Unreal!" The boy wandered into a large room, six feet by six feet by six feet. The walls were white and smooth and seemed to be made of some sort of metal, plastic amalgam. Over on the back wall were small holes, small holes beyond which bright light glared and cool air vented. He was well within the chamber when Snarfer quickly shut the door.

"What's going on? What are you doing to my brother?"

Snarfer laughed heartily, his eyes glowed red.

"You're not Snarfer!"

She was about to lunge at him but Snarf grabbed her by the neck and held her back. Snarfer approached with strange metal cuffs in his hands, constraints much like those Mandora used. He snapped the cuffs around her wrists and around a set of pipes that protruded from the wall. She still yelled, screamed, kicked her legs, shook her arms. She growled, she hissed but was helpless for she could not escape the restraints.

Snarfer walked back the unusual black door he had slammed closed. He pressed a few buttons, a few blue buttons and an even brighter light came from within the chamber where WileyKat was trapped. No one could hear him bang against the wall or scream for help because there came a loud, dull hum from deep with bowels of the Tower of Omens.

Snarfer stood in front of the black door that was then see-through clear. WileyKit had calmed her self down, or tired her self down that she only then understood what was going to happen. She shut her eyes and moaned in pain.

"Keep her eyes open, Snarf, I want her to see this!"

Snarf took out a some tooth picks from a cabinet drawer and used them try the girl's eyes open. He then stood behind her, her head in his hands, to make sure that she did not turn away from the gory, from the grizzly scene about to play out.

At first WileyKat's skin began to bubble, not noticeably, not violently, in fact it was almost imperceptible. Until his temperature became so extreme that the effect was grossly exaggerated. Around his fingers, his hands, arm, face, huge bubble would expand and then contract, randomly, chaotically. Then several that had grown around his fingers burst, blood in both liquid and steam form, burst out onto the walls. The flesh of his hands and upper arms wrinkled and charred back, burnt black though there was no fire, no flame. Similar effects had happened to his feet and lower legs. More of those flesh bubbles burst along his head and face. He jumped up and down, he banged against the wall more and more violently. He screamed and blood came out. The inside of his steamed in the intense pressure of the boiling saliva. His eyes, that he tried to cover with what was left of his hands, exploded in a mess of yellow pus. Then at last, then at the end when all was said and done, a large, a very large bubble, a bubble more massive than any that had come before formed along the bulk of his lower abdomen but unlike the rest that one did not contract. It expanded and expanded -- Snarfer was giddy in joy, he could not stop his laughter -- it expanded until at last it burst in a great sound all could hear over the omnipresent hum. WileyKat had blown up clearly in half.

The small snarf turned around.

"And now, my dear, what manner of death is in store for you?"

"Just do it and get it over with!"

"No, no, no, we must wait, wait until those Thundercats get a load of what I'm going to do to you."

Here's another one that was so thoroughly planned but never executed. In it WileyKat makes a horrific discovery -- something that I saw in a dream after I played Doom for 10 hours straight.

"Balloon Chamber"

By RD Rivero

May 18, 2000

Cat's Lair was deceptively quiet that night. Panthro was up in the control room. Snarf was down asleep in the cellar. Cheetara, Tygra and Liono were out in the countryside -- exploring, they said, wouldn't be back until morning, they said.

My sister and I were in our bedroom. She was on her side and I was on mine. The nocturnal silence was interrupted by the sounds of our breathing or, on occasion, by the clamor of her tossing, turning in bed.

I, for one, could not sleep. I turned to the right. On the table next to my bed was a clock that in dull, green letters displayed the time. "2:45 am," I whispered and by Jagga if that wasn't an ungodly hour to be awake. But if that was the case then why stay in bed? I pulled aside the blanket and rolled off the mattress as carefully as I could. I didn't want to wake her, even if she was at the far, opposite end of the room, oblivious to my motions.

The windows were opened -- the wire mesh screen was down to keep mosquitos away but I approached none the less, unmolested. Outside the sky was overcast, the air was calm for the most part and unscented. The forest that surrounded Cat's Lair swayed gently, caught in the wake of a strong current, but nothing, not even the rustling of the leaves and branches broke the oppressive silence of the world beyond.

I left the bedroom for the simple fact that there was little I could do there without disturbing my sister. Just because I couldn't sleep didn't mean that everyone else had to suffer. The door slid open with its characteristic machinations to reveal the interior passages. The halls were barely lit to conserve power -- shadow and darkness was everywhere except in the immediacy of the gray, glowing fixtures.

I told myself then that I would do some exploring of my own. I began at the top to work down to the bottom. In the control room I found Panthro -- he had been at watch but boredom had taken its toll. He was on a chair, slumped over the nearest countertop, his head snug within the comfort of his arms. He snored softly but audibly.

The control room was bright and because I entered too quickly the light hurt my eyes for a while. Buttons and panels blinked intermittently in multicolored hues. A low, faint hum resonated in the vast, upper recesses of the chamber. On the main view screen the picture was black except for three red dots closely bunched in a tight group. The lights were enclosed in a blue box formed from the cross-haired intersections of four straight lines, two vertical, two horizontal.

The red dots, no doubt, were the absent Thundercats.

I meant to walk out but I stopped in a moment of hair-raising terror. I heard a voice that took me nearly an eternity to recognize. It was Panthro. I looked, I tiptoed to his side. His head shook, his lips curled. He whispered from a dream, from a horrendous vision that unfolded in his mind. He spoke: "The giggling! Make it stop, make it go away. Giggling. Giggling." The rest descended into variant fragments that made even less sense thought that was possible.

Anyways, only I was awake and with nothing better to do I went down to the kitchen. My stomach felt empty and I ached for nourishment. I opened the refrigerator and on the shelves before me was a cornucopia of abundance. So much food I couldn't figure out what to eat and, just then, it hit me. I wasn't hungry, I was thirsty -- oh, well.

After that break I continued the expedition.

I was bitten by the bug of mischief. First, I snuck into Liono's room, but that place was usually dull, even when the sword and the shield were there. Oddly, I noticed that he had covered the vents over with boxes and furniture. That hadn't been so ever before. Second, I crept into Cheetara's bed, but somehow my sister would have enjoyed that place better than I. Still, she, too, had covered the ventilation shafts but had done one better. She had stuffed them with scraps of old clothes, coats, sheets and blankets.

At last, Tygra -- was I that bored? I yawned, yes, I was starting to nod off and I was sure that Tygra's room would put me to bed at once. I found chests and drawers full of every last possible article of his clothing. The closets had coats and other protective outfits but not much more. A drawing table contained the plans for a yet to be built tower along with the designs for new vehicles, engines and weapons that he and Panthro had worked on together.

I approached a small side table and opened the drawers. Within was an uncharacteristic, chaotic mess of schematics and architectural blueprints, pens, pencils, tools. Looking at it I knew that it was only a distraction, a ploy to disguise and keep hidden something he wanted no one to discover. I dug through the slosh pile and at the back, at the extreme end I found it -- a diary.

The journal had begun right after Cat's Lair had been built. The last entry was dated only weeks ago. Every entry started inconspicuously enough, with citations related to the most trivial facts. The morning, noon and evening temperatures, the average wind speeds and directions and only the most general, basic outline of the day's events. I wasn't fooled, though, for hidden in the paragraphs between the sentences of absolute tedium was a subtext of pornographic proportions, spiced with short commentaries about the Thundercats, the mutants and even Mumm-Ra. There was stuff there about the Warrior Maidens, too, but I'll spare the juicer details. Suffice it to say that the notes ranged from the way we looked naked to how our clothes conformed to the contours of our bodies and other observations of an extraordinary, perverse nature.

At first he talked about Liono -- a lot and he wasn't just admiring his "leadership abilities." He wrote of how he often caught him in the buff -- complete with drawings of nude to seminude lions with exaggerated anatomies -- how he would simply walk into his room and find him -- by Jagga, my eyes, my sensitive eyes!

For a time he alternated between Panthro and Cheetara. About Panthro he related what he most desired. The "working relationship with future possibilities" and the fantasies that if brought to fruition he thought might lead to "more, much more."

His attitude to Cheetara, on paper, was far, far different from what he purported around everyone else. He was jealous of that "loose and trifling WO-TO-MAN," so he put it. He complained of the apparent competition he had with her over Panthro's attention so much so that at the end he concluded "it would have been better not to have brought a female on board Exodus at all but that it was only by Jagga's influence that she tagged along."

His tone did change in the final entries. He tried to correct himself, expunge himself of those sexist slurs when he discussed an earlier relationship with Cheetara that went sour. Above all he was afraid that she might suspect him and reveal him to the others.

Liono continued to show up intermittently but something must have happened between them during the trials because Tygra concluded that "the Lord of the Thundercats is, in fact, unreachable. Our experimenting is over, his curiosity had turned a corner."

My sister was mentioned once only -- and all he said was how much trouble she got herself and the rest of us into. My own name never appeared. Though I looked everywhere, I couldn't find it in the diary.

Heavy footsteps came from the hall. My heart skipped a beat and for a brief moment I thought I was dead. Had the others returned earlier than expected? Was Tygra about to walk into his room, to walk in on me reading his journal? I jammed the book back into the chaos of the drawer and dashed into the one place where I thought for sure that I would be safe -- under the bed. The footsteps got louder, passed the door and then began to wane into silence. I sighed in relief but apparently prematurely for the footsteps returned and the door opened.

I stopped breathing and prepared for the worst. From under the mattress I could see that there was someone standing in the doorway silently, very silently still.

"Tygra's room -- why can't I hear the giggles so much from here? What has Tygra done? What? What?" It was Panthro again in that frightening whisper. He shut the door in a loud slam and continued on his way to his own room. That time I was more careful and did not make a noise until I was sure that he was gone, gone back to his own room.

I had to go back to the journal, I just had to look at it once more. The book had not been written in entirely -- about twenty or so pages remained blank and what was odd was that he had not missed one day since he had begun to use the diary.

Here was the last entry in full: "I heard it again last night when I couldn't sleep. I heard it from the vents that time so I had them sealed with cement -- an extreme solution for an extreme problem but there's no way to stop it at the source at the basement. The giggles. I moved the tall crates from the south end of the main wall. The crack was still there -- the mortar had failed to set and was gone, vanished entirely. Worse, the crack had gotten larger. So larger that I could peer into the chamber with a flashlight. I stuck my hole head in and I swear that I have never known fear before until then. The room is red inside. I saw something rise up from below -- it moved deliberately where I could not see it entirely and giggled.

"I don't know if the others hear it but they, too, haven't been able to sleep at nights regularly. Cheetara, Liono and even Panthro complain about being tired in the morning due to fatigue and I don't know how long we can last like this. I wonder if the kittens are aware of it but perhaps, perhaps it's my mental powers that allow me to hear the mocking laughter. The giggle.

"Is there no way to stop it? And where does it come from? From Mumm-Ra? But if it was so malevolent, why has the Eye of Thundera not responded, activated to the danger. Yet, strangely, everyone seems to rest peacefully outside Cat's Lair."

I thumbed through the blank pages because again I felt that there was something more there, something else there. Hidden. And once again I was correct -- it was the description of a "dream" and it was undated:

"I have seen what awaits beyond this world. It has come to me in dreams and by degrees very gradually. I'm in a large, circular chamber where my body -- what my mind can only perceive to be my body -- is dwarfed to obscurity in the immense outer wall of red brick. Above the ceiling is a dark blue mesh of intersecting lines intertwined. Below oozes bright fire itself upon whose boiling surface universes form and grow into infinity, ever darkening, ever disappearing from there to the void, to the nothingness beyond the scope of the outer walls, the nonexistence that the ceiling scarcely glimpses.

"I float in the ethereal substance toward the center where I see a giant cloud that spins forever around a bring vortex. The texture of the dense, gray mist is alive in the faces of all who have lived and died, everywhere and infinite and while I get closer I realize that the cloud is more than a montage of faces. It is all the faces at once -- it is only the weakness of my mind that sees that absolute perfection in fragmented parts. But --"

That's how it ended.

I put the diary back into the desk drawer where I had found it, exactly the way I had found it. Tygra had a sharp eye that I knew could pick out even the slightest detail so I had to make sure not to leave one strand of fur behind.

Of course I went down the basement -- after that I had lost the desire to sleep entirely. I found the trek through the recesses of Cat's Lair dreadful and I was so uneasy, too, after those last two journal entries. I had never heard a giggle come from anywhere -- especially not the basement. Although lately everyone seemed eager to leave Cat's Lair to go on some excursion. Maybe something was going on just under the surface.

After I wrote Fragments I decided that it needed a sequel to better explain it. In this story Tygra was supposed to be freed from the grips of that mysterious woman and in the process certain other secrets were going to be revealed. I was going to use the Mutants here, along with Zeno but, again, I couldn't get past the first scene.

"Judas"

By RD Rivero

July 3, 2000

"We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with asleep."

[Part One]

In the early morning the sky was light gray. Dense clouds hung together, high in the air in a quivering mass. It was cold for summer, unnaturally cold. A sudden breeze came down from the north and shook the dead, petrified trees that leaned at bizarre angles to the ground. Brown, crisp leaves rattled in a wail that began low, inaudibly, grew into a scream and ended in a dying whisper. Gnarled, emaciated branches snapped and fell to the dry, sandy earth.

Cue treaded slowly across a wide embankment of thick mud. It had once been a river, the lifeblood of a mighty empire but that was a long, long time ago and now it was a sludge, polluted with bones and corpses bleached and withered by the elements. He saw the heads of worms, poking up from the filth, squirming in the moldy, slimy ooze.

He saw, too, a faint and withered set of footprints preserved in the baked mud. He stopped and leaned closer to it, he ran his fingers through the impressions. In an instant he was brought back to that dreadful day and he gasped -- he would have been one of those heaps of bones that surrounded him had he not been strong. The imprints were cleft and deformed but not by time for the trail was petrified and perfectly preserved.

He had headed then in the same direction he was now, a tunnel opening that jetted out into the body of the river. He remembered that it was larger back then and he laughed softly to himself, smiling as it were through tears. After so long the memories were still there, still strong.

Cue looked up. Above the black pyramid loomed high like nothing else. the tall obelisks shot into the air like knives stabbing the sun's bright glare with their darkness.

He entered the tunnel -- thunder clasped and the ground heaved. "He is awake," he reasoned, "at least I won't be disturbing him."

The smell of decay ended ten feet into the dark tunnel. The mud had not yet entered that far. There were no animal remains in there, too and he guessed that was why he had decided to go in that fateful day. He tried to shake the thoughts from his head, he believed he would out grow them but no, that was not to be.

He felt the walls with his hands, arms outstretched, not that he needed any direction, the path was burned into his mind. The walls were rough and brittle. His hands and fingers were coated in that chalky, arcid substance.

When the passage ended he was well within the interior of the pyramid. The room was small and square-shaped. The floor was intended and consisted of square sections, each deeper than the last. In the olden days when the river was pure and fertile the waters would flood into the chamber and collect in those squares to form pools. The walls were smooth and though he could not see well he could tell by touching their surface that figures were covered and painted on.

The stairs in the back wound into the main chamber. At last he came upon the only light so far -- red and dull, shadows danced across the black, stone floor. The torches adorned the inner sides of the tall pillars that supported the massive vault. The sound of the burning was deafening although it was barely over a whisper.

Cue stepped out from the shadows and toward the circular pool of boiling, purple water. The four statues of the ancient spirits of evil loomed around him in an inescapable circle. In the back was the sarcophagus, open, the lid stood upright upon the floor.

He said nothing: Mumm-Ra had noticed him but continued to speak the soft incarnation. The mummy rubbed his fingers over the turbulent water and a sparking, violet mineral sprinkled into the pool. The waters bubbled even more violently, then receded in a flash of white light to reveal an image cast in a thin, blue haze. Cue could see clear, glass tubes and the suggestion of people within then the devil priest clapped his hands and the magic was gone, vanished.

The lights from the burning torches -- that oddly were never consumed, never really burnt -- deadened a little more. A red glow came from his eyes while Cue stepped silently upon the platform, next to the shrouded figure. He had forgotten how much taller he was, he looked down upon Mumm-Ra and though his face was cloaked in shadow he could see the outline of a smile.

"Father," he said.

When I was a junior in high school I wrote a play called Escape. A while back I decided I'd try to fix it and turn into Thundercat fan fiction -- I worked backwards but was never able to make enough progress. In the future I think I can do it but I need time and that's not something I have much of lately. The idea of Mandora being a nasty jail warden I revisit elsewhere.

Act Four Scene Five -- [The next night. Two guards sleep before Alluro's cell door.]

Alluro: Is it sleep, real sleep, or is it what I know it is? [He sticks his hands out and pokes one of the guards.] Good, very good. Mandora would be proud. It doesn't matter if you're asleep or not -- this is the perfect time. [He hides handwritten papers under a pillow. With the key he opens the cell door.] What do I care if it's left open? Wait, wait, wait -- is the garage being used today or tomorrow? It doesn't matter -- I'll go to the torture chamber. Yes! It's door is open, always open. I'll go, put where's that place again?

[He roams through the hall, guided toward the source of screaming, talking. He enters the torture chamber slowly and stands behind tall crates.]

Jackalman: Why are you doing this?

Mandora: What? You think I even care?

Jackalman: WHY?

Mandora: Why, why, why -- you mutants ask too many questions! [She strikes him with a baton.] Why -- because you deserve no less. Why -- because you're animals. Why -- because of the pleasure, the orgasmic pleasure. Ha, hahaha, hahahahahaha!

[She uses a chain saw to hack his arms off. Blood sprays in the air -- he screams.]

Alluro: I have to get out of this place -- and that Mandora is the only thing in my way. Ah, but there's another guard here, too. [He looks around at the crates.] What's in these boxes? [Mandora continues to laugh while she moves down to Jackalman's legs.] Keep laughing, keep laughing. Behold! Gasoline, kerosene, fuel oils -- but how do I ignite this stuff. [He opens one box and removes a clear, glass case of a red liquid. He gets up slowly and crawls through the shadows scavenging for supplies -- the floor is littered with spare and half-used material.] Matches and a knife -- this should do.

[He cuts a hole in the side of a crate. Gasoline trickled out -- he lights a match and drops it on the pool. At the same time he jumps to the side near the torture devices. The crate explodes. Mandora, in shock, drops the running chain saw on Jackalman's head. After the fireball dissipates only Alluro and Mandora are left on their feet, the room consuming in flames around them.]

Mandora: I should've killed you when I had the chance. You think you can escape?

Alluro: Oh, planning to stay? [He looks left to right.] Your pleasure palace is in flames.

[The fire spreads quickly.]

Mandora: Was it the door? There, there. [She points to the open door in the background.] What do you expect to find?

Alluro: Freedom.

Mandora: Freedom's a dangerous thing, 18045. [She picks up the chain saw, it's still running.]

Alluro: What now? Going to kill me too? You don't have the --

Mandora: What do you think? What does it matter what you think? An idiot trusting anybody.

Alluro: RD?

Mandora: For the last time, there's no RD.

Alluro: Liar.

[Several guards enter.]

Mandora: Fools! Get the others, get the others to put out these flames! The fire is what's most important!

[The guards scramble to leave.]

Alluro: You'll pay for this, for killing my friends, for torturing me. I'll have revenge!

Mandora: You can do nothing. You'll not leave here alive.

Alluro: The guards at my door -- they never slept, did they?

[Mandora lunges at him with the chain saw. Alluro checks her with a pipe from the ground. The chain saw falls from her hands. While she goes down to recover the weapon he has already left -- he runs out of the open door to the word outside. The room continues to burn, other guards enter.]

Guard #3: Where's Mandora.

Guard #2: Search the platform.

Guard #1: I found her -- she seems to be unconscious. I'll take her upstairs.

Guard #2: Wasn't there someone else here too?

Guard #1: It doesn't matter, just get her out of here.

Guard #2: This could take all night -- I hope there's enough water.

Act Five Scene One -- [Hours later, after dawn, before Alluro's cell door. The fires have been extinguished.]

Mandora: He's not in there, I know that, but open the door anyway.

Guard #1: He left it open -- someone else must have shut it during the fire.

[He opens the cell door.]

Mandora: This jerk lived like an animal. Look at the garbage everywhere.

[She throws stuff around.]

Guard #1: That's a letter under the pillow.

Mandora: [She takes the folded papers from under the pillow.] It's addressed to me. [Reading:] If you've found this then I've already left this hell -- or dead or alive. I'll assume alive but don't expect something as trivial as my death to stop me. How should I begin? I know the truth now, it's all come to me, it's all here now. I am a political prisoner, banished from the freedoms of life because I happen to disagree with the practices and policies of the Thundercats. Yes, I have come to terms with reality. Don't try to find me, I don't intend to be recaptured. I want revenge -- and here I'll list just what I'll do so that you'll know it was I who did it. I'll find the pit where you dump the bodies of prisoners you've tortured to dead. I'll find the pit and dump the corpses into the wells from which the prison gets its water. I'll sabotage the vans that come to the prison, I'll make their trips unbearable. At last, I'll set fire to the prison -- [She crushes the paper.] I want him found -- ALIVE!

Guard #2: He's probably dead --

Guard #1: How could he possibly do what he's threatened. He's crazy and the letter's the living proof.

Mandora: [She shakes her head, she looks down.] Fine, fine, fine. I want this prison watched day and night. Make sure nothing happens -- shoot anyone behaving suspiciously.

Act Five Scene Two -- [Several days later, in Mandora's office. A knock from the door.]

Mandora: Come in. [A guard enters.] You've something to say?

Guard: [Slowly:] We found out what's contaminated the well --

Mandora: Well? What is it? Spill it out!

Guard: A body -- a dead body.

[Mandora pounds on her desk.]

Mandora: Why didn't you people see something?

Guard: It must have happened at night, when we --

Mandora: Damn it to hell! Order a double watch!

Guard: But we don't have enough men. Who'll keep an eye on the prisoners?

Mandora: A subversive you'll said would die lives. Leave and follow my order! [The guard leaves.] My fault, my fault -- the guards should've shot him from the start, the moment he unlocked his cell door.

Act Five Scene Three -- [Days later, at night. In the garage. Mandora and several guards are present.]

Mandora: I don't understand what's taking so long? And you best not eek his name out to me. I don't want to hear his name mentioned again.

Guard #3: Someone's coming --

[A man enters.]

Mandora: Who are you?

Man: One of the drivers -- we need assistance. Our tires were blown out.

Mandora: That's all? That's all? That --

Man: While we were investigating we were ambushed by, by this man. Dead bodies and body parts were thrown at us. A gun must have been stolen, a shot was fired into the tank. Part of the van exploded and in the mass confusion crates of gasoline were stolen. Those of us who're still alive are stranded five or six miles down the road.

Mandora: Get the squad on the phone -- they'll get the trucks ready.

[She runs out of the prison through the loading bay of the garage. She stands in the roadway. She sees lights through the trees -- faint and distant. A guard comes to her side with a phone.]

Guard: You wanted the squad?

Mandora: [She takes the phone.] What are those lights?

Guard: Search lights from the men around the van.

Mandora: The van is miles away -- it's probably nothing. [The other end of the line is answered by a woman.] This is officer Mandora, the warden from prison 185. I have to report an accident. One of the vans that comes here monthly has encountered mechanical problems and is stranded on the road miles from the compound.

Woman: I have the information -- we'll send a unit over right away.

[The line goes dead.]

Mandora: Right away. Three weeks. Send guards and the man to the van. Bring the survivors back with supplies.

Act Five Scene Four -- [That same night, in Mandora's room. She is asleep. A guard enters frantically.]

Guard: Mandora! Mandora! Wake up --

Mandora: What? What? What the hell?

Guard: A fire --

Mandora: Calm down! What fire?

Guard: The lights you saw down road -- the man was escorted to the van -- I mean -- it's a fire and it's encircled the prison compound!

Mandora: It is close?

Guard: See for yourself --

Mandora: [She ran to a window and pulled back the blinds.] In the name of all the gods at once. The front line is only a hundred feet from the prison walls! What can we do?

Guard: It's too dense and too hot to break through.

Mandora: Dump water around the prison walls -- not all the water -- just enough to keep it from spreading --

Guard: And the prisoners?

Mandora: [She turns her head and looks at him. Her face half in, half out of shadow.] Does it matter? Does it really matter now?

Act Five Scene Five -- [Hours late, in the courtyard. Nearly all the guards and Mandora are in the center of the pen. Mandora is talking into the phone.]

Mandora: Hello? Hello?

Guard #4: Bad connection?

Mandora: This thing never works. What's the status of the fire?

Guard #2: Close and getting closer.

Mandora: Can we hold on? [She throws the phone onto the floor.] Damn!

Guard #3: That was our only phone now how do we --

Mandora: [She punches him.] I don't want to hear it.

[A guard runs toward her.]

Mandora: What do you want?

Guard #5: The prisoners know about the fire -- they've rioted, they've broken down their cell doors, killed guard, stormed the torture chamber, taken weapon and -- and are headed up! So many, so many! Unstoppable --

[He collapses.]

Mandora: No, don't revive him. Order the men into the courtyard. We'll fight off the prisoners when they arrive. The fire can wait.

[The guards establish a defensive perimeter around the courtyard. The prisoners come up in waves and are shot down before they can make it into the pen.]

Mandora: How are we doing?

Guard #7: There are hundreds of prisoners and not many of us --

Mandora: We fight to the last man.

[The courtyard in surrounded. Only three guards are left in the pen, including Mandora. Prisoners are coming up from the main stairwell.]

Prisoner #5: Good, you're still here.

Prisoner #3: Still alive. How goes the fighting?

Prisoner #5: Well, very well, we've pushed the guards into the courtyard and have killed most of them.

Prisoner #3: Mandora?

Prisoner #3: We haven't seen her.

Prisoner #1: I see her --

Prisoner #3: Where?

Prisoner #1: In the center of the courtyard. Only three guards protect her.

Mandora: Do you think it's going well?

Guard #6: Look! The prisoners are breaking in! The prisoners are breaking in!

Mandora: It's over! Over!

[Prisoners enter with a variety of weapons. The walls of the pen smolder, the fire has breached the compound.]

Mandora: Kill me?

Guard #7: Torture you -- where do you think He got the chain saw?

Mandora: [She speaks to the mob of prisoners pouring into the courtyard.] Listed to me, listen to me! He's done this to you, Alluro, he's set fire to the prison to kill you --

[She falls to her knees.]

Prisoner #4: Shoot the guards.

Mandora: What are you going to do with me? No! No, don't come closer! Don't come any closer. No! Alluro! Alluro! Damn you!