[ASH] ASH #45 - Monster Hunters

     [Hype: Go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ash_stories/ for details on
an open-to-all Time Capsules anthology special!]


    //||  //^^\\  ||   ||   .|.   COHERENT COMICS UNINCORPORATED PRESENTS
   // ||  \\      ||   ||  --X---------------------------------------------
  //======================= '|`         ACADEMY OF SUPER-HEROES #45
 //   ||      \\  ||   ||                     Monster Hunters
//    ||  \\__//  ||   ||          Copyright 2003 by Dave Van Domelen
___________________________________________________________________________

     [cover shows an angry centaur, mouth foaming, charging at the
      reader.  It seems to be injured, but not slowed in the least.]

                       ACADEMY OF SUPER-HEROES ROLL CALL

CODENAME       REAL NAME                POWERS                   STATUS
--------       ---------                ------                   ------
Solar Max      Jonathan Zachary         Spacetime Control        ACTIVE
                 "JakZak" Taylor
Comet          Sarah Grant-Taylor       Superspeed, Ice Body     ACTIVE
Green Knight   Salvatore Napier         Strength, Regeneration   ACTIVE
Contact        Aaron Zander             Psi, Mind-over-Body      ACTIVE
Scorch         Scott Handleman          Pyrokinetic              ACTIVE
Beacon         George Sylvester         Living Light             MEDICAL LEAVE
Essay          Sara Ana Rodriguez       Gadgeteer                ACTIVE
Peregryn       Howard Henderson Jr.     Elemental Mage           ACTIVE
Lightfoot      Tom Dodson               Velocity Control         ACTIVE
Breaker        Christina Li             Telekinesis              ACTIVE
Fury           Arin Kelsey              Concussion Blasts        ACTIVE
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[June 19, 2025 - Chicago, Illinois Sector]

     "Sarah...your shoulder's all glowing or something."
     JakZak and Sarah were in their quarters at the Chicago HQ, having just
gotten back from a final mystic exam.  Peregryn had claimed there was no
permanent damage from the near-shattering Sarah had suffered while fighting
the Minotaur...but had he missed something?
     "Huh?"  She looked down at her right shoulder, then her left.  "I
don...wait, yeah.  Something's different."  She peered closely at her left
shoulder. 
     Sarah was "undressed", having removed the torn skiing suit she wore as a
costume, but was still wearing an icy simulacrum of her original uniform,
headgear and all.
     JakZak stepped closer.  "It's...hairs?"
     Indeed it was.  Thin filaments of ice caught the light and refracted it
into a rainbow halo when you looked from the right direction.
     "Oh God...am I mutating?" Sarah tried to keep the panic out of her
voice.  She was only just getting used to being made of ice, and to have
things change again?
     "I don't think so," JakZak ran his fingertips experimentally over
Sarah's cold shoulder.  The hairs bent rather than breaking, just like the
hair within a few centimeters of her head.  And where the area covered by
hair ended, he could just feel a small ridge, the texture of the ice changing
ever so slightly.  "I think," he paused, not wanting to get either's hopes
up, "I think it's a tear.  Your uniform got damaged."
     Shock and disbelief warred in Sarah's features.  "But...I tried
everything to remove my uniform.  It's part of me, I couldn't even chisel it
off, it'd come right back."  As if to prove this, she tugged on her gloves,
which stayed firmly in place.
     JakZak stifled a chuckle.  
     "What?"
     "We never tried having someone *else* take them off," he smirked.  
     Sarah laughed, the tension in the room breaking.  "Yeah, how dumb is
THAT?" 
     "Hold still," JakZak placed his hands on either side of the icy headgear
that formed a seemingly permanent part of his wife's features.  As he lifted,
the helmet stuck for a heartstopping moment, then slid up and over her face.  
     He set it down on a table, where it started to melt.
     "Is that better?" he asked.
     Sarah gasped.  "I can hear!  I mean, I can hear a lot better, I could
still hear before, but now...I'm babbling."
     JakZak smiled and ran a finger along the curve of her ear.  "Like a
brook," he nodded.
     "Ooooh, that feels good," she leaned into her husband's touch, and he
ran his fingers through her icy hair for a moment, then pulled back.
     He rubbed his hands together for warmth and smirked.  "Let's try a glove
next." 
     This was harder, because Sarah's uniform had been designed to be slick
and give very little air resistance, but slowly they were able to work her
right glove off.  As the thin "fabric" got far enough from her body, it lost
its suppleness and shattered, leaving frozen eggshells scattered about the
floor.  
     Sarah put her hand up to JakZak's face, running it over the beard
stubble that had grown up in the past day, then through his crew-cut hair.
"I thought it was being turned to ice that was making everything seem dull
and numb," she smiled.  "I guess I was wrong."
     "Let's see how wrong," JakZak smiled as he started to pull down the
zipper on the back of Sarah's uniform.  "And maybe Essay can build me some
sort of thermal-insulating force field later...."

               *              *              *              *

[June 22, 2025 - Chicago, Illinois Sector]

     Tina let herself be carried by the milling crowd slowly filtering into
the Episcopal church building, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible.
She'd even dyed her hair back to its natural black for the day.
     She carefully picked a place on one of the benches near the middle of
the house of worship...growing up at colleges had taught her that sitting at
the back drew almost as much attention as sitting up front, and it was
usually negative attention when you sat in back.
     Someone sitting next to her pegged her as new anyway, and tried to
strike up a friendly conversation.  She went through on automatic, smiling
and giving the story she'd invented just in case: college student visiting
friends over the summer break, came here on their recommendation, probably
wouldn't be back next week, etc.  The last part was true enough.
     Why was she even here THIS week?
     That one was easy to answer, if hard to deal with.
     She was scared.  Gods were starting to walk the Earth again, and the
news had hit her like a hammer.  She'd been raised nontheist, in the sense
that she didn't believe in an omnipotent God who was to be worshipped.  No
one in her generation could be truly atheistic, not after gods had nearly
destroyed the world in 1998.  The line had been moved, though, and theism now
meant belief without proof in a God who no longer made flashy and obvious
moves among mortals.  A God who was above the wars that seemed to occupy all
the so-called Purebloods.  A God who had never been mortal, yet who had also
sent his mortal son to save us all.
     And, most importantly, a God who was as far above the Purebloods as
those godlings were above Tina.
     Faith wouldn't protect her from death, she knew that.  The faithful died
all the time.  But death wasn't the end, either.  George was proof of that,
wasn't he?  Would God protect her from what might happen after death?  And
was a faith driven by fear worth anything?
     As the service started, everyone around Tina seemed to be generally
happy with their situation, comforted by their faith.  She wondered if she
could ever find that comfort....

               *              *              *              *

[June 22, 2025 - Mexico City, Mexico]

     Whatever church Sal went to was always crowded.  It wasn't that Mexico's
Catholics were exceptionally observant...well, it wasn't *just* that.
Rather, Sal was just really, really popular.  People wanted to worship
wherever he did, and would start gathering around him on Sunday mornings as
he made his way to Mass.
     Sal had pretty quickly realized that he wasn't going to have the luxury
of a regular place of worship.  If he started going to one church regularly,
it would be mobbed by Saturday evening every week.  So he picked a different
place every week, trying to make sure he spread the love, as it were.  He had
an agreement with the Archbishop: he'd let the relevant parish priest know in
advance so preparations could be made to have extra communion wafers, more
ushers, etc...but word would not be "leaked" beyond that.  No one would be
turned away, portable speakers would be ready to wheel out at the appropriate
time so those crowded outside could hear the sermon, and the collection plate
would be passed around the entire crowd.
     Of course, the betting on which church would be the lucky one had
started almost immediately, and Sal had wisely gotten his hands on a really
good randomizing program so the bookies (and the eager faithful) wouldn't be
able to guess his next stop.
     All of that made Sal feel like he was on a concert tour, especially the
part where he'd be mobbed by groupies after the service.  So far none of them
had done anything inappropriate to the holy setting, fortunately.  It helped
that it was widely known that he and Arin were an item, and that she was
always waiting for him outside, like now.
     "Come on," she urged, pulling at his arm.  "You've been putting off the
answer to my question for days, we're going to go somewhere private so you
can spill the beans."
     She pulsed with power, a gentle shove that got the crowd to step back a
meter or so, and then directed her blasts at the ground, hurling the two into
the air.  It always surprised people when she showed she could carry Sal
around when flying...she was such a slip of a girl.  No, of a woman.  But
like all supernormals, she was a lot stronger than she looked.  She might not
be able to toss tanks around like Sal could, but with effort she could haul a
few hundred kilos into the air.
     Within minutes, they had landed in the arid mountains that ringed Mexico
City.  
     Arin launched right into it.  "What did you mean when you said the Pope
was pagan?  Is pagan, even?  Spill it, or you have a long walk back to town,"
she frowned.  She was quite serious, Sal could tell.  She may have been
raised by people who though the Pope was a servant of evil, but she
understood geopolitics well enough to be concerned by any hint that this was
true and not just religious bigotry.
     Sal shrugged.  "Okay, I don't have tapes of Pius XIII dancing naked
around a fire or anything.  Most of this isn't public knowledge, but it's
stuff that we have access to if we go looking.  And after Rebus's shot at
godhead, I started looking."
     He sat down, and gestured that Arin should do the same.  "Pius was an
Anchor, that much everyone knows.  Not only did he die Anchoring the Curse of
Tezcatlipoca, he also made his name as a 'monster hunter' when he was
younger, using his Anchor effect for exorcism and the like.  And, according
toe STRAFE's files, Pius was a member of the Conclave, just like almost every
other Anchor in a position of social, political or economic power.  It
sometimes scares me how successful the Conclave was at creating a true
worldwide conspiracy, and I'm glad that their main goal was just keeping
dangerous supernormals Anchored."
     "Fine, Pius was in the Conclave.  And I suppose Paul VII is also
Conclave?" Arin cocked an eyebrow.  "But what does this have to do with being
pagan?"
     Sal nodded.  "Cardinal Stagliano was a Conclaver.  But the Conclave was
already falling apart when he became Pope, so there's no guarantee he was
selected on their say-so.  Still, there's whispers that he's been involved in
some fairly questionable stuff...anyway, the pagan part is a bit of intuition
and some digging on my part.  Grind probably knows, and he's probably told a
few people he thinks need to know.  But the Conclave had a sort of 'house
religion' that you almost had to subscribe to if you wanted to advance in
their structure.  Devlin Marx, for instance, was also known as the Eye of
Horus.  And we all know Archangeli's aspirations.  If you wanted to be big in
the Conclave, you had to worship the Egyptian gods, or at least give them
convincing lip-service.  I expect both Pius and Paul practiced some form of
syncretism, finding a place in their Catholic faith for other gods, possibly
taking inspiration from how the Coptic Christians incorporated a lot of their
ancient gods as angels and saints.  Horus becoming St. Horace, for instance,
and minor gods finding their way into the ranks of angels."
     Arin narrowed her eyes.  "I'm not sure I'd really call that paganism,
then.  Isn't angel-worship part of Catholic practice already?"
     Sal shrugged.  "In a way, yeah.  Most people have trouble with an
infinite God, and prefer some sort of intercessor that's more
comprehensible.  A saint, an angel, some minister of grace to protect them.
And I was kinda joking when I called the Pope pagan, but both Pius XIII and
Paul VII do seem to be a lot closer to pagan than the usual sort of Catholic
mysticism.  I mean, my gramma memorized the names and duties of something
like a thousand saints, and was always ready to tell you who to pray to for
any little thing, but that's not quite the same as playing around with spells
that can summon up Purebloods."
     "Fine," Arin sighed.  "But please don't joke about the Pope being pagan
around anyone else who can hear, okay?"
     Sal nodded in the direction of the great valley.  "In Mexico City?  I'm
not sure I'd survive the backlash," he grinned wanly.

               *              *              *              *

[June 23, 2025 - Italy]

     A great power had returned to the world, that much was certain.  Not a
god, not exactly.  Simon wasn't sure how he knew, but he knew he'd recognize
the feeling of a full-blown god walking the Earth.  But this was definitely
something akin to a god.  A demon, or spirit, or perhaps a very powerful
monster.  
     Monsters had roamed parts of Greece for decades, he knew, but they
rarely showed up on his mystical "radar", at least not in the time he'd been
studying magic.  He hadn't had a mystical radar before that, he was pretty
sure.  Or had he?  He sighed...he had learned much in the past few months,
but his own past had not been included in that curriculum.
     Whatever this new presence was, however, it was in Greece now.  He
couldn't be too precise with his passive spells, but he thought the presence
was in the vicinity of Olympus, which had a number of disturbing
implications.  For reasons that might have been shadows of his missing
memories, he feared the gods of Olympus more than any other group.
     He mentally catalogued the scrying spells at his command, more powerful
means of gathering information than he had used so far.  There was a danger
in them, however.  The spells he had been using were like using a telescope:
limited but passive, with no hint they were in use.  Now he contemplated
spells more like radar or sonar, which sent out a mystic signal to "ping" off
the target.  These could be detected, and draw the attention of the subject,
attention Simon wasn't sure he wanted.
     It was a quandary to be sure.  Because, with that power across a mere
sliver of a sea and a few hundred miles of land, it would probably be
entering Simon's life shortly no matter what he did....
 
               *              *              *              *

[June 23, 2025 - Chicago, Illinois Sector]

     Another day, another mall, another set of disguises.  Scott sighed.
Lesson received, Professor...learn to be more subtle.  Learn to deal in good
faith when he didn't necessarily agree with the deal being made.  Skills a
kid lacks but an adult needs.
     "Here's the deal, Coulter.  We've kept your bombshell secret, but we
can't give Anya the same blanket pardon we're offering you.  Sit down,
Robert, I'm not done yet.  Anya was involved in the Battle for Montreal, and
while that can be seen as an act of war rather than a common criminal
offense, it's a Big Deal.  People are not going to accept a full pardon for
her other acts on top of not putting her away as a POW."
     "She's not even a Combine citizen," Coulter pointed out.
     "That just makes it worse, and you should know that.  She participated
in the breakout from the Cavity, a Class One felony on its own, even if no
one can prove that the five guards who died from 'ricochets' were actually
victims of her turning their bullets back on them.  By all rights, we should
just arrest her and put her on trial...you've been pretty clever about
hiding, but we've been keeping the two of you under close surveillance for
the past few weeks now."
     "Fine.  What *can* you offer us?"
     Scott sighed.  George had suggested just seeing it as a puzzle and
trying to solve it, leaving out any personal feelings.  The fact that he
hadn't really been given a reason to *personally* hate Spiral had helped, but
still....  "To start with, house arrest at the Academy, in one of the wings
still being converted.  You will be free to come and go, but she will not, at
least initially.  She will have to enter a guilty plea to reduced charges,
probably a Class Two felony of some sort, the details are on this chip,"
Scott pulled out a small plastic case.  "Once she's served enough time that
we can change her status without howls from the press, she'll be put on
parole, probably under your watch, assuming you haven't screwed up somewhere
along the line before then."
     "So, she'll be hostage to my good behavior?" Coulter half-snarled.
     "More like the other way around.  You're getting pardoned if you take
this deal, Coulter.  No take-backs.  But if she tries to escape or otherwise
violate her parole once she's on it, we can just fire you and let you go free
into the world."
     The expression on Coulter's holodisguise wilted slightly.  "Where
everyone still after my shiny metal ass will have free shots at me."
     "Exactly.  We're willing to trust you.  Anya, however, we're not.  If
she demonstrates she can be trusted, she can get some freedom, maybe even a
faculty position if she demonstrates a skill we want the kids learning."
     Coulter pondered for a moment.  "I'll have to talk it over with Anya."
Another pause.  "But...to be honest?  I really didn't expect anything this
good.  Anya's not a bad person, all in all, but she's done some pretty nasty
things, and that's just what she's been willing to tell me so far.  I'd think
you'd want her locked up in the Cavity for good."
     "Coulter, being a reporter, even if only for a magazine like Para, has
probably given you a pretty cynical view of the government.  That it's a
monolithic pile of stupidity and red tape, and that the best thing you could
say about it is that it's usually too tied up in its own failings to do much
harm."  
     "Sounds about right, yeah."
     "Well, it's only half right.  It's a huge organization dealing with an
even huger population...that doesn't leave much time for the sort of
individual attention that you need to NOT come across as stupid and
bureaucratic.  But it's made up of people, many of whom are intelligent and
give a damn about where the world is headed.  And one thing that these people
have learned is that when a 'supervillain' tries to go straight, it's in
everyone's best interests to help them as much as possible.  Maybe not much
will be possible, and you can't be naive and take claims of going straight at
face value every time...but we try.  Tell Anya that, and tell her not to make
us regret trying."
     "I'll...do that, Mr. Handleman."  With that, Coulter picked up the chip
case and rose from the table.  And to any casual observer, an elderly black
man walked slowly out of the food court, leaving the bearded young man he'd
been talking with to sit alone in silence.

               *              *              *              *

[June 25, 2025 - Shattered Hellas]

     The centaur loosed its last arrow, flinging a barbed taunt after the
barbed arrowhead.  "Why should I follow you, o fallen one?  It took bold
Heracles to best my kind, and only clever Daedalus to ensnare you!"
     The Minotaur decided not to let this shaft shatter on his mystic shield,
instead catching it with the ease of a boy catching a ball tossed by his
father.  "That you think bravery is more important than intelligence is part
of why you *should* follow me, wild one."  He gave the arrow an easy
underhand lob so that it stuck in the dirt a few paces from the centaur.
"Feel free to try that again, if you think it will help."
     The centaur picked up the arrow and, snarling, slid it back into its
quiver.  "I am the grandson of Chiron.  My people did not even bow to the
gods, though the gods could destroy us all.  Now that the gods have left us
again and we are free of their terrible lightnings, why would we take up the
bit from one whom the gods have humbled, MINOTAUR?"
     A dangerous glimmer flashed across the Minotaur's eye, and he smiled.
It was not a pleasant sight on a face like his.  "Yes, history knows me by
the name they placed on me...my true name only survives in corrupted form as
the city Knossos.  Moloch stole my past, and history now records my worship
as being a corrupted descent of his worship.  My powers were vastly reduced,
my stature changed to that of a clever monster who was bested by mere mortal
heroes.  I even served as their errand-boy for a time.  But does it not say
much for me that I have survived all of this?  Too, consider a very important
consequence of my fallen status: I am no longer considered a part of their
time-spanning wars.  I am free to make my own destiny again."
     The centaur shifted dubiously.  "But what destiny *can* you make without
your godly powers?"
     "What destiny can anyone make?  That which we take with our own hands,"
he clenched his fists in emphasis.  "I am a mighty power in this mortal
world, and it is within my ability to forge an army of you cast off stepsons
of the gods who inhabit this shattered land.  You claim you are free now, but
you are free only to wander these lands and run afoul of their dangers.
Should you try to leave, to enter the lands of the humans, you would be
hunted down and killed.  Follow me, and we can make all the world ours, to go
where we will!  Pledge your name and your service to me, to Q'Nos, and this
can be yours.  Oppose me, and your tanned hide will adorn my palace atop
Mount Olympus."
     The centaur nervously fingered the string of his bow, laboriously
braided from the hairs of his own tail.  "I...must discuss this with my
brethren."  
     "By all means," Q'Nos beamed.  "But do not take too much time.  The
humans are taking an interest in this land...war with them may come to us
sooner than any of us would like."
     The centaur nodded, then trotted off into the ever-present mists of the
valley.  
     Q'Nos turned and faced a point in the air, as if looking at something
that only he could see.  "I make you the same offer, little mage.  Italy is
not so very far away, after all...."

               *              *              *              *

[June 26, 2025 - Delphi, Greece]

     "I'm tellin' ya, we're not gonna find shaggy-butt here.  The Minotaur's
a Cretan.  And a cretin," Peter muttered as they bounced along the ill-kept
road in the back seat of an official car on loan from EUROPA.  "The minotaurs
we ran inta last time [ASH #10 - Ed.] were Khadamite mean genes.  Fakes."
     "Humor me, okay?" Contact smirked.  "I'm playing a hunch.  Crete doesn't
offer the Minotaur anything but old memories, but Greece offers him a lot of
the things I think he's looking for."
     "Like what?"
     "Well, concealment for one.  Delphi is at the edge of the clear zone, go
much farther and there's all sorts of weird stuff...mystic deserts, eternally
misty valleys, Mount Olympus itself.  The land defends itself pretty well,"
Contact noted.
     "That might be changing, sir," the driver called back from the front
seat.  
     "Oh?" Peter and Aaron replied simultaneously.
     "The Moslems have this holy man who claims to be able to cleanse the
land," the driver remarked.  "So far it's just talk, but there's a lot of
worry at the higher levels that the Moslem Confederation is going to try to
drive across Greece and link up with the handful of their co-religionists
hanging on in the Balkans at the edge of the meteor-blasted parts of Serbia.
So it might not be possible to hide in Shattered Hellas for much longer, even
if this holy man can't actually do what is claimed."
     Aaron contemplated this for a moment.  "Actually, I think that plays
right into the Minotaur's hands, assuming he's here."
     "How could it?" Peter asks, bewilderment clear on his face.
     "The other thing Greece offers is the makings of an army of monsters,"
Aaron explained.  "Not just natives like you, Peter, but some of the things
unleashed in the later days of the GodMarket, like Set's Warhounds in
Croatia, or the strange sapient colors that arrived on the meteor strikes.
If the Minotaur knows about the impending conflict, he could use it to weld
all these chaotic creatures into a single force, smash the invading Moslems
as a show of power, and then go on to conquer.  At least, that would be his
plan.  He also might be canny enough he'd try to portray his actions as
protecting his 'citizens' from the Moslem menace, to keep the Union from
interfering as he sweeps east."
     "Can't say as I like the sound of that, sir," the driver said.  "He
could even justify going towards Egypt under the excuse of helping repatriate
those Warhounds, couldn't he?"
     Any further conversation was cut off as they rounded a corner and saw a
hulking figure, easily twenty meters tall, striding towards them on the road
to Delphi.  It held a gnarled tree as a club, the root ball serving as the
club's head.  And it had a single eye in the middle of its forehead.
     Contact pulled on his goggles.  "Cyclopses eat people, right?" he asked
Peter.
     "Been known ta, yeah."
     "Stop the car, I'm going to go see what the big guys wants," Aaron was
already opening the door.
     "Yes sir," the driver replied coolly, attempting to project a "Just
another day in the neighborhood" attitude and not entirely succeeding.
     Contact jumped out and sprinted towards the oncoming giant.  +-I hope we
can end this peacefully,-+ Aaron thought to his "better half."
     -+I wouldn't bet on it,+- came the answer from the part of Aaron's mind
that still thought of itself as Paul Mahler.  -+He's radiating hunger and
hate like a bonfire.+-
     "Hey, there!  Big guy!  How's it going?" Contact shouted up at the
lumbering cyclops.
     There was no real response, merely a grunt as the monster reached down
and tried to grab Contact in one huge and filthy hand.
     -+He wants to eat us, and not in any way that I'd approve of,+- Paul
informed Aaron.
     Contact boosted his leg muscles and jumped up and out of the way.
+-Kinda figured.-+  "Okay, going to be the hard way," he muttered aloud.  
     He danced back from a swing of the improvised club, then jumped onto the
arm as it slowed for the backswing.  He ran up the confused giant's arm and
was on its shoulder in the blink of an eye.  
     And then he slammed his fist down the cyclops's ear canal, hammering on
the massive eardrum.
     The cyclops reeled in pain and confusion, stunned by what amounted to
boxing his ears.  It dropped the club and tried to swat away this
surprisingly painful entree-to-be.
     -+I've got what we need to know,+- Paul noted.  One reason Aaron hadn't
worked particularly hard to integrate his brain, aside from having something
of his deceased lover to hold onto, had been the fact that he could multitask
better this way.  Aaron would take care of the physical stuff as he was used
to doing, and "Paul" would handle the mental intrusion.  -+Feel free to drop
him anytime.+-
     +-Thanks kindly for the permission.  Here's something I've been meaning
to try out, and I think his brain's weak enough I can pull it off,-+ Aaron
replied as he easily evaded the giant's attempts to smash him.
     "SLEEP!" Contact intoned, driving the force of his will into the tiny
brain of the giant creature.
     It paused, then let out a mighty roar...no, a yawn.
     Contact jumped free as the cyclops crashed to the ground and started
snoring in a way that called to mind a jet engine.
     "I've called in our people to take it from here," the driver called out
from the open car door.  "But I'm afraid we can't go any farther until they
arrive...the monster is blocking the road," he gestured at the sleeping hulk.
     "No need," Contact replied as he got back in the car.  "I found out what
I wanted to know.  The Minotaur's here in Greece.  He's set up shop on Mount
Olympus and is gathering an army.  Big guy over there didn't want to join up,
but also didn't want to join his brother in death, so he was looking to find
greener pastures.  Better warn your people that the cyclops is probably not
going to be the only one looking to stake out new territory...."

===========================================================================

Next Issue:

     Geopolitics and geomancy collide as Q'Nos flexes his muscles and expands
his influence in ASH #46, "The Minos Touch"!

===========================================================================

Author's Notes:

     The first scene was actually written last, after I'd sent out a rough
draft of this issue to the other ASH writers for comment.  One commented that
the issue seemed a little short (although this was mostly in comparison to
the rather large #44), and I decided that it would be a good time to put in
the next step in the Taylors' story.  I'd always intended for the ice costume
to eventually come off, and getting damaged in the Minotaur fight seemed like
a good excuse to let them figure out it could be taken off.
     It's stuff like the first scene that tempts me to someday do an "ASH Sex
Special" or something like it (maybe more like Avengers v3 #71 than like the
Elementals Sex Specials).  They certainly do have pretty bizarre sex lives,
for the most part, if you think about it.  Tantric magic, dealing with bodies
that are no longer normal flesh and blood...and then there's Contact's mind
over body powers and a whole raft of implications of sex for telepaths, heh.
On the other hand, some of the logical consequences that have come to mind I
should probably just keep to myself.  }->

     On topics other than the prurient, the Moslem Confederation has largely
been ignored for the near-decade I've been writing ASH stuff, and I decided
it's time to rectify that.  Things have been mostly peaceful for the past
fifteen years in the ASH setting, largely because powers have consolidated to
the point where wars require a pretty serious committment.  But with Khadam
and Rebus having shaken things up recently, some within the Confederation are
looking to see if they can get a small conquest going while everyone's worn
out.... 

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