36: Sparrows Before Bulls

The command vehicle stopped.

“Major,” his driver said.  

“Yes?”

“Got a sitch up here.”

Nakba looked up at his wall of screens, his eyes climbing to the driver’s and gunner’s viewcams.  There in the early morning light, blocking the armored column like sparrows before bulls, stood a blurry but familiar trio.  He tried to focus the image some but it didn’t get any better.  

“Looks like our girl has decided to come home on her own,” said a radio operator, Nakba couldn’t remember her name.  He fumbled some painkillers out of his vest pouch and washed them down with cold coffee.  “Do we call off the search, Major?”

“Not yet,” he croaked.  His voice lower due to lack of sleep.  Loss of consciousness didn’t count as sleep.  “Let them keep looking.”

“For what?”

“For whatever they find,” he keyed up the column command frequency, “D and D; cordon the area but do not engage and do not pressure the subjects.  Just keep everybody else out and them in…” he toggled off, “..hopefully.”  He watched them watch the soldiers disembark and disperse a moment.  He tried and failed to gauge the threat.  The woman betrayed as much as the sand above a buried scorpion.  The child looked nervous, shifting feet and hiding behind Ch’loi.  The former camp cook was probably another pint away from being a corpse.  “Nothing, absolutely nothing,” he muttered.

“Sir?”

He pulled his helmet on and even cinched it down tight.  He tested the com, “Fourth quarter, game’s on the line.”  The operators gave him a thumb’s up and so he punched the hatch and picked up his bodyguard waiting for him outside.  He added to their numbers as they walked down the line to the lead vehicle, gathering nearly a full platoon before they walked through the forest of legs of the walking-tanks.  Overhead a flock of drones kept long range watch.  In between their orbit and the ground, a swarm of gnat-drones flew in and out in seeming random patterns.  It was all a ridiculously impressive response for one tiny female, a street urchin and dying blind guy.  The platoon fanned out.  Nakba stepped into the ring.  He locked eyes with Ch’loi.

“What?”

She cocked her head, “One has not spoken yet?”

“What-do you want?  i’m busy so make it quick.”

“One desires safe passage for One’s companions and self.”

“Oh, we’re running a taxi service now?”  She said nothing.  “Why would we take you anywhere?”

“One has information the Major requires.”

“Nope, nope.  Nope.  Don’t care anymore.”  He turned to walk away, only a little unsteady.

“One has come to warn the Major.”

He was glad to have a reason to stop.  His body came to a halt but the world swayed a little.  “Warn away.”

“A Swarm is imminent.”

“A swarm?”  He took a deep breath to settle his stomach.

“A-“ but whatever she was about to say was drowned out at that moment by a fanfare of trumpets and a radio operator in Nakba’s headset saying, “Major, there’s a local delegation moving our way from the South.  Picket is asking for orders and rules of engagement.”

“Ah joy.  Tell them to let them through, and then shut the door behind them.  Fire only if fired upon.”  He suppressed a sigh and a desire to lean against something, he was nauseated and his head ached, even with the painkillers but indecision and weakness were nothing to show the enemy or for that matter, his own men.  What to do with Our Lady of Oneness and her mission of mercy?  Couldn’t have them talking to the Grand Poo-bah, Mucky-muck, vizier, whatever these desert vermin called their chief.  Corrupt, is what they should call them.  Whatever he wanted, he didn’t need his attention split between them or the Mucky-muck finding a new ally.  “You wanna lift?”  She cocked her head.  “A ride.  You want us to take you back to the mainland?”

“One would be grateful.”

“Swell.  Sargent!”

“Sir.”

“Load her Gratefulness and her luggage on carrier three and have your squad keep them company there.”  The man nodded and turned to go, “Oh, Sarge!”

“Sir?”

“They are our guests, you understand?” he held the Sargent’s gaze, Sergeants didn’t become NCO’s by being dumb and oblivious to nuance.  At least he hoped this one hadn’t.

“Sir.”

“That’ll be all then," as they were safely dealt with Nakba caught his first glimpse of what appeared to be a royal procession, bloody palanquin and gold plated honor guard and all.  “Alright, what does this moron want?”

35: The Last Boat Out

A blur of feathers and shadow startled the child.  It swooped over their heads and onto a unlit lamp post.   In fact, no light shone anywhere in this grubby part of the city.  The weird lady made them walk down the middle of the street.  And though it was dark, the child felt horribly exposed.  As though the jackal buzzard were not the only predator sizing them up.  And as soon as she thought this shadows came out of the buildings and stood around them, shadows in the shape of men.

“Is it you?” one of them asked.

“Were it someone else,” the man with them answered.

“We were beginning to doubt you would make it.  Come, the Captain is anxious to be on the move well before dawn.”

“A minute,” the man’s wife stopped her husband and handed him their dead child.  Then she grabbed the weapon from one of the shadow men and pointed it at the lady.

“Laperte!” the husband yelled.  All of the other shadowmen pointed their guns now but no one quite knew where to point them.  The man stood between his wife and the lady.  The lady did not move.  She did not put down Ch’Byartha.  “Laperte!  Don’ do this!”

“Move.”

“Laperte, mon cher’, this is not our way!  This is not what we do!  It will not bring her back!”  He stayed between the gun and the lady, still cradling his baby.

“Her people killed my child!  She said so herself!  I will do this, a life for a life!”

“You of all people!  You are trained to save life, not take it!  It solves nothing!  They are under our care!  The laws..”

“What laws?  What laws?  Laws didn’t save my daughter!  What laws!”  

Their voices echoed.  The shadowmen shifted their feet.  Someone whispered to the man.  The child wanted to run but felt tied to Ch’Byartha.  Would they shoot her?  She knew names now, had seen faces.  She had run the streets long enough to know the underworld killed to protect secrets.   

“Laperte, lower your voice.  Lower the gun.  We must go.  We must not do this now.  We must not draw the attention.  We must leave.  Now.”

The gun did not waver.  The voice did lower, to a menacing whisper, “She does not go.”

“Laperte..”

“She does not go!”

The shoulders slumped, “she does not go, oui.”  The gun lowered, the woman, Laperte, took back the baby.  He turned to the lady, “I am very sorry.”

“One understands.”

“The child and the wounded one stay as well,” Laperte said over her shoulder.

“Bon Dieu!  Laperte, what?”

“They came together.  They brought l’Vampire.  They stay!”

One of the shadowmen said, “Les Consummateurs?”  The shadowmen moved away.  Their weapons focused on the lady, Ch’Byartha and the herself now.

The man sighed.  “Again.  I am sorry.”  They began disappearing back into the shadows.  Their weapons the last things to be seen.  After a while, even the jackal buzzard lifted off and flew away.  They stood alone in the dark until a small sound drew the child to the end of the street.  They were on outer wall of the city, she hadn’t realized till just now.  Between the iron pickets she could just make out a mule team pulling a sandboat away.  She could see nothing more but she knew it was the smugglers’ boat.  The man and the woman and her dead baby escaped on it.  The last boat out.  The last chance to go West.  Before her lay the Sand Sea which could drink a body dry in a week, behind the things that drank babies dry in a night.

She screamed.  She threw punches at the woman.  “Y’coulda stopped dem!  Ya lettem go!”  The woman said nothing.  After a while, the child collapsed against Ch’Byartha’s shrouded body.  He groaned something which almost sounded like words.  “He gunna die.  We gunna die.”

The lady said nothing.  She pulled one of the iron pickets loose and hurled it at the night sky.  A Legion machine fell nearby, skewered like a kabob.  The lady went over and looked at it.  “Those who carry illicit cargos are not the only ones with the means to leave the city.”

34 One

The strange, little woman appeared as if from nowhere in the alley where they were hiding.  She and Hova spoke.  Something was decided.  Laperte did not care.  She held her child, her precious baby girl, so light, so wrong, so dead in her arms and wept.  She could not stop.  She could not see where she was going.  The little waif that came with the woman led her by the sleeve.  They would go, they would stop, they would wait, they would run, they would skulk.  All the while, Laperte carried her baby and wept to herself.  If only her tears could swell the child’s husk back to life.  If only she could give her own blood to revive her heart’s treasure.  At last they stopped.  They told her to sit.  She sat.  She cradled her child’s body and sang a lullaby.  Hova came to her then.

“Cherie,” he worked his mouth.  It had nothing to say.

“What did this?” she asked.

“We will wait here, a friend of mine is preparing passage for us.  We must leave the city.”

“What did this?” she asked again.

“Cherie, it is no use.  Perhaps we should..”

“Do not!  Do not try and manage me!  Do not shush me!  What did this?”  

He hung his head, “Les Consommateurs.”

“Les Vampires?  They are myths!  Myths do not suck children dry!”  She stood up.  She glared about and found the strange little woman.  “You!  You know!  What did this?  What .. ate my child?”

The woman met her gaze, “The answer is complex.”

“Simplify it!”

“There is a greater evil imminent.  It chose to deny its master the youngling.  It thought this a kindness.”

“It.  Thought.”  Laperte stood over the little woman.  She loomed over her.  She thrust her dead baby at her and held it inches from her face.  “This!  This is a kindness??”

“It is what it thought.”  The woman did not blink.  Did not shrink back.  Did not show any emotion that Laperte could see.

“What did this?”

“Laperte,” Hova tried to step in, “this is peu serviable.  Please.  Please.”

“She knows.”

“Of course she knows.  Now please, sit down.”

“Not until she tells me what she knows.”

“Laperte..”

“Not until she tells me!”  Laperte stepped around Hova and faced off again with the alien woman whose face beheld her dead baby without tears, without anguish, without care!  “What did this?”

“One’s kin.”

“One’s?  Whose?  Whose kin?”

The woman finally blinked.  She slowly raised one hand which still wore a broken manacle.  She touched her own breastbone.  “One.”

sorry for the delay

i know, i know,

it's still not a new chapter... though i've been trying to get back to it. 

Here's another crappy monotooth illustration instead, sorry.

If wishes were time to write and draw...

Nothing new to post but intentions and hopes...

And this hideous digital painting of Ch'loi without her headcovering.

33: Sisters

Overwhelmed.  Too much was happening too fast.  The one known as Ch’loi did not know how to react.  One’s primary purpose had been to preserve the life of one’s guide.  One had taken the secondary purpose of preserving the life of the child.  These mysterious benefactors had provided security and aid to one, the guide and the child.  One owed them a debt of thanks.  One added them to one’s circle of preservation and purpose.

“The circle must go,” Ch’loi told the man and the woman.

“What?”  Only the man could answer and but weakly.  The woman was distraught over it’s infant’s husk.

“Bring one’s kin, there is much danger here.  Hurry.”

“What are you talking about?” the man asked.

“Those which drank the infant are… imminent.”  The man made no move.  One would have to compel the circle to move.  “Hey!  Let go of-“ Ch’loi grabbed the man and the woman together, nearly throwing them out the door, “Child, come!”  The child thankfully, responded.  “Take the man and woman outside, keep in the open, keep in the light.  Wait for One there.”  

“Whutta Ch’Byartha?”

“One will bring the guide when one comes, if one is able.  Go.”  The child took the man and woman by the clothes and pulled them down the stairs.  The one known as Ch’loi shut the door, drew the long knife one had taken from the kitchen on the way upstairs and looked up into the darkness overhead.  “One is aware of the Harvester’s presence.  To remain hidden is irrelevant.”  It unfolded itself from its hiding place, a thin, spidery shadow among shadows and dropped to the floor in a crouch but it did not attack.  It simply waited, anxious and maybe a bit afraid.  “One drank the infant?”  The harvester chopped once in the harvester sign language for yes.  “Is one a scout?”  Again the chop.  “Yet one has the reek of kinslayer.”  There was a slight bowing of the head.  Shame.  “Has one betrayed one’s kin?”  An aggressive slash!  No!  “Has one.. betrayed one’s Factor?”  Chop-yes.  So this harvester had rebelled against the hive order but felt as if it had not betrayed its kin.  Its… sisters.  The word came suddenly to Ch’loi.  It caught her by surprise.  It rushed into her mind like those first words of the Firemaker so long ago!  It caught in Ch’loi’s mind with barbed meaning and sharp memories.  It stuck.  It tore.  It hurt.

“Did you…” she wanted to ask, why?  Why have you become kinslayer-betrayer?  But how to put that into a binary series of questions.  “Are one’s kin with one?”  Slash-no.  “Imminent?”  Yes.  “Is one’s… Factor imminent?”  Chop, chop, chop!  Yes, yes, yes!  Ch’loi felt the cold prickling of an old familiar fear.  “How many?”  The Kinslayer knocked it’s footbone against the floor.  Thud,

 thud,

 thud,

 thud,

 thud,

 thud,

 thud.  Seven.  Yahweh have mercy!  Seven Factors imminent!  A swarm!  Given a large enough food source it would become a new hive!  

And it was here in Aedlin.

32: Breaking loose

Discovery.  The meat animals entered the room where the Kinslayer hid.  A mature and a youngling, the mature went straight to the former youngling, the one the Kinslayer had drank.  

It shrieked.

Its wail tore something loose in the Kinslayer.  Something buried deep.  A memory.  A memory of a night, long ago.  Of a kin, no, not kin, not kin… a … person.  

More meat animals rushed into the room.  It was here!  The One-who-traded-corpses-for-food and another came in.  This was it!  The Kinslayer’s purpose!  One had succeeded in finding the One-who-traded-corpses!  Fear!  Panic!  Need!  One needed to act.  One was afraid.  One was unsure.  The meat animals were alarmed.  Unpredictable.  Likelly to attack as a clutch.  Success required control.  One preferred to wait.  To get the One-who-traded-corpses alone.  One remained in one’s hiding place.  

Then the Kinslayer heard it.  It was too late.

They had come.