Yet for a brief moment, she brought peace.
For a brief moment, the battle paused, and Earthlings and Bahayans stood together as brothers, gazing upon the sight above. Upon an angel wreathed in light and haloed by fire.
"Take me to the river, my friends," Maria said.
The Santelmos carried her over the battlefield, past artillery craters, and toward a river that snaked among the charred trees. There had been a fishing village here once. The bamboo huts had burned. A few villagers had tried to flee in boats; the boats were still docked, and skeletons smoldered inside.
If this war ever ends, and I ever fly to Earth with Jon, I will never forget these horrors, Maria thought. I will never more be pure. I will always be a broken angel of war.
She landed by the bamboo piers and stood among the skeletons. The Santelmos hovered before her, bobbed as if bowing, and then flew off. Maria watched them hover across the water toward the distant shadows.
All but her dear Crisanto. He remained at her side, floating above her shoulder.
"Crisanto, do you want to fly off with your friends?" she asked. "To live with your own kind?"
He nuzzled her, soft and warm against her cheek. Then he flew into her pocket.
There were too many skeletons to bury. Maria approached a fishing dinghy, one that didn't seem too badly damaged. The hull was charred but still watertight. A mother and child huddled inside, burnt down to bones. A year ago, Maria would have recoiled in horror. But she had slept in stone coffins. She had danced with the dead. She was no stranger to skeletons, and she gently pulled the bones from the boat, placed them into the water, and whispered a prayer. There was holiness to a river. The water would carry the fallen souls to a better place than this.
Maria flowed down the river too, sitting in her boat. She needed to get back south. To Mindao. To the Bargirl Bureau.
She touched her earring, feeling the tiny camera that had recorded the general. She had heard his confession. And on her ear, she carried it trapped like a ghost in a bottle.
I must find a way to leak this to Earth, Maria thought. There it will spread like wildfire and burn them all.
* * * * *
Maria walked into Mindao to find a changed city.
On the surface, it was the same Mindao as ever. The market still bustled with merchants hawking spices, religious artifacts, snake oil in glass bottles, and alien wares from across the galaxy, most made in workshops just down the alleyways. The bargirls still stood outside their clubs, eyes dulled with shabu, slender hips thrust out to mimic Earthling curves, lipstick bright red like flowers calling butterflies. Endless tangles of electric cables still draped across the streets, crackling over canyons of concrete, plywood, and neon lights. The Earthling soldiers still prowled the streets, some fresh off the starship, hot for flesh and booze and killing, others haunted by the battlefields.
Yes, the same Mindao on the surface. But Maria knew this city like the face of a lover. She could read every hint in its rotting, rusty lines and weeping streams. The city had changed.
The shopkeepers were not calling out their wares, each louder than the other, competing for the attention of shoppers like male birds calling for a mate. They simply stood behind their baskets and carts of goods, eyes darting nervously. The Earthlings were not catcalling, drinking, or carousing, but walking stiffly, guns clutched in their hands. The bargirls stood alone, attracting no clients, and fear filled their eyes. With no work today, tomorrow they would not feed their children, nor buy shabu to dull the pain. The radios and televisions still crackled in the kiosks and bars, but instead of broadcasting Lady Boxing or Bahayan pop songs, they were reporting the news.
General Ward was dead.
As Maria walked by a kiosk, she caught a snippet of broadcast.
"… those responsible for this act of terrorism. Undeterred by the shocking news, President Hale has vowed to increase his bombing campaign of North Bahay. Speaking from his palace in South Bahay, President Santiago has committed to join forces with Earth and finally defeat…"
Maria walked on. She had heard enough. Yes, General Ward was dead, but the war was not. In fact, it was escalating.
She touched her ear.
Earth must hear what I heard. That Ward himself, architect of the war, admitted it is unwinnable.
She reached the Blue Boulevard, once her home. Many urchins made their home along the Blue Boulevard, for Earthlings often came here searching for bargirls. Many Earthlings, despite being an enemy force, were kind to the urchins and gave them money and food. The street children knew this, and they filled the alleyways, sat on concrete staircases, and scurried between shadows, sometimes begging, often selling everything from a song to a cigarette. Some sold more.
But it was daytime, and the bars were empty, and the neon lights were off, and only one or two Earthlings were here, passed out drunk from last night's festivities. Emboldened by the sunlight, the urchins ran toward Maria. She knew them by name.
She gave each child an Earthling dollar, her remaining allowance from the general. Tonight perhaps they would fill their bellies with cups of rice and tamarind soup, not scraps from the trash.
"Rally the Bargirl Bureau," she told them. "Wherever they are in the city, find and summon them. We meet among the dead."
* * * * *
The Bargirl Bureau gathered in the city cemetery, their old haunt. There were no trees, grass, or flowers here. In a crowded city it was a crowded cemetery. The gravediggers, out of room, had stopped digging graves. Thousands of coffins now lay aboveground, some stacked several high, forming a city for the dead.
Maria thought of her days living here, sleeping in a sarcophagus, sharing it with bones. A community of lost souls lived here among the dead, sleeping in the coffins. Maria had been one of these gravedwellers. She had danced here in nights of fever dreams, hand in hand with the skeletons. With the general, she had lived in an ivory tower among the clouds, but now once more, she dwelt in half-life.
Pippi sat on a stone coffin, kicking her dangling legs. On each of those legs, she wore stockings with differently colored stripes. The bargirl blew a bubble of gum. It grew as large as her face, then popped, getting gum in her pigtails.
"Ow, my hair!" Pippi began pulling gum off her pigtails. "My hair is my livelihood!"
"Your hair looks stupid," Charlie said. "What kind of a Bahayan girl has orange pigtails anyway?"
Pippi stuck out her tongue at the older bargirl. "The kind that likes to make money. Why do you think I also draw freckles on my beautiful caramel skin? It drives the Earthlings wild. They pay double. I remind them of the girls back home."
Charlie rolled her eyes. "You remind me of a psychotic clown."
Pippi blew her a raspberry, then turned toward Maria. "Hey, Maria! Did you really have to kill the pute general?" Pippi looked around her and shuddered. "I miss your old penthouse. Now we have to meet among the dead again, and you know I'm scared of ghosts."
Charlie shoved the younger bargirl, nearly knocking her off the coffin. "Oh, you stupid girl, Pippi! We're not going to keep the war going just so you can piss in a golden toilet."
"The toilet at my old penthouse was ceramic, I think," Maria said.
Charlie snorted. "Yes, well, it still beats what Pippi does now, which is piss in the alleyways."
"You know I only did that once!" Pippi said. "And only because there was some stinky pute who had stunk up the bathroom in the club. Okay, also that time I drank too much beer and the alley was closer. Twice, no more! Okay, maybe three or four times, but—"
"Girls, girls!" Maria said. "Can we focus less on Pippi's bladder and more on my secret recording?"
She had shown the girls the video she had recorded in Mother's Womb. They had all watched, slack-jawed, as General Ward confessed that Earth could not win the war, that he was butchering Bahayans for sport.
"We must show this to Earth." Maria raised a codechip, a little electronic device which contained the video. "But how?"
Charlie brushed dust out of her hair, then shivered. "Ugh, mummy dust in my hair. And all over my beautiful high-heeled boots and leopard skin skirt!" She began brushing them too. "Dead people crumbs all over me."
"Charlie!" Maria rolled her eyes. "It's just regular dust. Focus. How do we leak this information to Earth? I know we used to leak information at the Goodbye Kisses booth, kissing Earthling soldiers before their flight home, and slipping the codechips into their pockets. But I'm scared to try that again. After what happened last time…"
Pippi popped her bubble gum again and raised an eyebrow. "You mean after how you abandoned us at the military police raid? After we all ended up in prison, while you were cavorting around on your golden toilet?"
Maria placed her hands on her hips. "You know I saved you from that prison, don't you?"
Charlie began brushing dust out of Maria's hair. "Oh, sweetie, the Goodbye Kisses booth is dead for good. The military police already knows our tactics. They scan every pute soldier who leaves Bahay, dead or alive. My cousin Manuel helps the MP, you know. An informant. He told me. If we hide codechips on any pute soldier, even the dead ones, the MP will find them. They check everything so thoroughly."
Pippi gasped. "Do they even check their butts?"
Charlie rolled her eyes. "Stop thinking about butts all day long!"
"You're just jealous because my butt is bigger than yours." Pippi popped her gum again.
Charlie shook her fist. "No it's not, I have a butt like a pute girl! That's why the Earthlings love me. That's why someday soon, an Earthling will marry me, and he will take me back to Earth, and I'll have that golden toilet you dream about so much, and only my butt will touch it."
Maria chewed her lip, considering. The sun was setting, and the first stars emerged. With them, some of the gravedwellers emerged too. During the day, they slept in stone coffins, shying away from the world. In darkness, they shoved off the stone lids and crept outside, much to the chagrin of the bargirls, who squealed and shrieked in fright. All but Maria, who had spent many nights here. She knew all the gravedwellers by name, knew their sad stories, their hopes, their dreams—even their warts and rashes, which they often complained about.
"Ghosts!" Pippy cried. She began beating one of the gravedwellers with her purse. The old man cried out and fled, nearly tripping over his long white beard.
"It's all right, girls!" Maria said. "Calm down, they're not ghosts. They're just people who live in the coffins. Like I did." She thought for a moment. "Like I do again, I guess, with my penthouse gone. So much for golden toilets."
The girls settled down, but they still glanced nervously at the gravedwellers, these decrepit people with their papery skin, long white hair, and yellow fingernails, for they seemed like beings from another world.
The dead—the actual dead—never emerged to dance before midnight. They had some time. Maria definitely didn't want the bargirls around when the skeletons began to dance. Pippi's swinging purse would be scattering bones everywhere.
Maria hefted the codechip in her palm, chewing her lip.
How do I get this to Earth?
There was only one man who could help her now, she realized, and he was half a planet away.
I need to get a message to Jon.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The Hunt
His angel had hurt him.
His angel had shattered his body and heart.
And so, Ernesto decided, his angel must suffer.
He prowled the jungle like a panther. His left eye was blind. But his right eye saw far. It pierced the shadows like a beam of black moonlight. His body was scarred from fire and lead, but he was still silent, fast, strong.
Movement caught his eye.
Ernesto pounced.
The creature reared and bleated. A greendeer, one of Bahay's native lifeforms. It stood on its hind legs, raising the other four in the air. The beast was enormous, larger than a horse. Its antlers coiled like branches, and its green fur bristled, mottled with gray and black, blending into the jungle. It was a fierce animal. Ernesto had seen greendeer take down a manananggal, a great predator of the rainforest, a creature even the strongest warriors feared.
But Ernesto had no fear. The fire had burned that out. The bombs had purified his soul.
He leaped onto the greendeer, dodging its kicking hooves, and grabbed it by the antlers. He wrestled the beast. It bucked again and again, trying to shake him off. But Ernesto clung to the animal. It was several times his size. Ernesto refused to let go. He dug his fingernails through thick fur, then bit the throat.
The greendeer screamed, a sound almost like a human cry. Ernesto sank his teeth deeper, biting through fur, skin, and flesh, finding the jugular and tearing it out.
The greendeer wept, tears falling as its lifeblood flowed. Ernesto watched it die, his own blood dripping. The beast's antlers had cut his arms. But he was victorious. He stood above his prey as its life faded.
He carved off a leg, and he devoured the flesh raw, absorbing the nutrients of the forest, of the proud animal's soul and strength. This was no animal from Earth, not like the mules and cats and mice, invasive species the first colonists had brought here centuries ago. This greendeer had evolved on Bahay, its proteins alien, its wisdom great. Ernesto too was a creature of Bahay through and through, connected to this world his ancestors had colonized. He was native. As pure as the rainforest and the life within. He was no longer human but a being of the rainforest, a savage of the moss and blood and old gods.
He lifted the rest of the carcass. It was heavy, but Ernesto carried it across his back. He would not disrespect the beast by leaving it to rot.
As he walked through the forest, he remembered carrying sacks of fish through his village. Those had been good days. Before every dawn, he would leave his home, along with his father and brothers. The rest of San Luna would still be asleep. The farmers would not wake for another hour to tend to their rice paddies.
Ernesto had loved those early mornings, walking between the bamboo huts, the world so silent, only the twin moons lighting his path. Whenever he would pass by Maria's hut, he would smile, think of seeing her after the sun rose, of bringing her a fresh fish to fry. A gift. He loved bringing her gifts from the sea. For him, the son of a fisherman, the sea was full of more secrets and wonders than even the famed rainforest.
He would board a reed boat with his father, while his brothers rowed the family's other two boats. The Santos family was renowned in the village, the only family to own three boats. Parents across the village would bring their daughters for dinner, hoping for a match with a Santos brother, for the men of the family were successful, strong, handsome.
That was before the scars. Before the iron plate in his head.
Yes, many families hoped for a match. But Ernesto refused them all.
"I want just one girl," he told his father. "I want Maria de la Cruz. She's the most beautiful girl in the village."
His father scoffed. "The de la Cruz family is poor. They have only one hut, only one daughter, only one terrace in the rice paddies."
"I don't care," Ernesto said. "She's who I want. I love her. I will never love another."
Maria was only thirteen then, a playful little girl, often laughing and asking questions, but meek whenever Ernesto approached. How she captivated his heart!
So the families met.
And they arranged a betrothal.
But not to Ernesto.
Maria was given to Roberto, his older brother.
How Ernesto raged! How he wept! How his heart shattered!
Every day at sea, Ernesto thought of her. He and the other Santos men sailed deep into the waters, filling their nets with Bahay's treasures. With circlefish, perfectly shaped for the plate, and iridescent eels with scales like tiny jewels, and squids with tentacles the villagers liked to fry. Sometimes Ernesto found strange, beautiful creatures in the sea that nobody recognized. Especially when they sailed far out. Creatures with m
any spines and deep blue scales. Blobby fish with sad eyes. Strange beings with spiraling shells, fins like ribbons, and many lures that shone like stars on slender barbels. He always brought them to Maria. She feared them, but Ernesto knew the creatures were priceless gifts.
Yes, those had been innocent days.
Before the fire.
Before the Earthlings had come.
Ernesto had been just a boy. But he remembered that day. Remembered seeing the cruel machines of metal fly above. Remembered seeing the Earthlings walk through the forest, trampling, killing, their machines uprooting trees. He remembered the refugees arriving at San Luna, burnt with fire, deformed with poison, speaking of atrocities in the north.
And he remembered the day his brother died.
The day the Earthlings murdered him.
Ernesto wept that day, clutching his brother's body, a body broken and burnt. He howled at the sky, shook his fist at the flying machines, and vowed revenge.
He inherited Maria that day. She became his betrothed. She became the best thing in Ernesto's broken life.
I got what I wanted, Ernesto thought.
But the cost was so high. A dead brother. A broken heart.
He could not give her up now. He could not lose Maria again. He must find her. Or his brother's death was in vain.
"You took her from me, Jon Taylor," Ernesto whispered. "You took everything from me. You shot my skull, and you took my sanity. You stole my betrothed, and you broke my heart. You bombed my people, and you shattered my world. But I will take these things back, Jon Taylor. I will take back Maria. And I will take back Bahay." His eyes stung, and he clenched his fists. "You will not win."
Birds cawed. Ernesto looked over his shoulder. Black and red birds covered his greendeer carcass, picking at the meat. He caught one and snapped its little neck. The others fled. He walked onward through the rainforest.
He crossed streams, climbed hills, and trudged through mud and moss and thick brush. The trees soared around him, a great cathedral, and mist floated beneath the verdant canopy. This was a holy place. This was why he fought. He hated the Earthlings. He hated Jon Taylor. But more than hate, it was love that filled his heart. Love for Bahay. Love for the trees and animals and beauty. Hatred fueled him. But love was the engine deep in his heart, burning hot.
Earthling's War (Soldiers of Earthrise Book 3) Page 23