by Tim C Taylor
Until Arun tried leaping onto the Trogs trying to kill Springer, he’d forgotten his legs had been amputated many years ago, after a long session with Tawfiq’s favorite torturer.
He slid to the floor in an explosion of pain, but he didn’t hesitate for an instant, slithering over to where Springer was dodging the stamping Trog feet. He pushed himself onto her chest and wrapped his arms loosely around her neck.
“Let me take their blows,” he told her. “And when you see your moment, get out and run while I distract them. Get help. Maybe this is a Trog civil war.” He paused and looked into her wild lilac eyes, which stared over his shoulder at the Trogs. The insectoids had fallen silent.
“They’ve stopped, haven’t they?” he said.
She nodded. While he brushed away the blood running into her eyes from a head wound, she added, “I think they want me dead. But not if it means hurting you.”
More of Arun’s memories came back online, important ones from when he was a cadet – the agony as Pedro had forced a scent emitter into his chest, so he would be recognized forevermore as a Nest sibling.
He twisted around and stared up into two pairs of swirling antennae extruded from snow plow heads.
“Back off!” he shouted.
They obeyed, retreating to the entrance.
Springer sat up, arms around Arun who perched on her lap.
“She’s with me,” he said firmly. “She is of the Nest. You will protect her with your lives.”
The Trogs bent their forelegs and knelt in submission. Their scent emitted a complex message of eagerness to obey, combined with the terrible acknowledgement that they had transgressed.
“General,” Scipio was saying out of the cube that had toppled with Arun onto the floor. “What the frakk is going on?”
Arun couldn’t answer. There was far too much happening for Arun’s mind to process. All he could do was hang tight and hope his pounding heart wasn’t about to explode. He’d joked with Pedro long ago that his scent implant would one day make him the warrior queen of the ants. Well, he had two big beasts in front of him waiting for his orders. If that was all he had to process, his mind could have handled it. But Springers breasts were rubbing against his back with an insistence that he couldn’t ignore now that they weren’t under attack. A few feet away, Nhlappo and this mystery fleet were talking out of a ration cube from the future, and Springer was nuzzling his neck, and… and then one of the Trogs spoke!
— Chapter 21 —
Governor Romulus
Beneath the ruins of the White House
Tawfiq explained her plan for apotheosis in every terrible detail, relishing my horror whenever she reminded me of the part I had played in making her ascent to goddesshood possible.
A million Ultra Janissaries – the New Corps she called them – would swear loyalty just outside the White House in Victory Mall in a ceremony linked to millions more waiting in secret galleries dug beneath North America. My memories have been fragmented for years, but her words sparked a recent memory of being shown hints of a new Janissary army that would defeat her Hardit rivals, but I didn’t trust my own memories. Besides, Tawfiq had lied so often to me that I didn’t know whether to believe any of this, but that wasn’t good enough for her. She wouldn’t allow me the escape of doubt.
So she showed me. All of it.
Tawfiq had previously escorted me on many journeys through the galleries beneath the main White House complex. I had seen the factories in which Janissaries were made, and the vile tanks in which human children were fast grown into adult Faithful. There were development labs where specimens of Faithful and Janissary alike were experimented upon in the never-ending search for design improvements.
Beneath that were the secret new looms for the Ultra Janissaries. And if I truly had seen them before, it had only been a glimpse of their true enormity. Hidden deep beneath the ground, Tawfiq’s secret looms stretched on for miles and were layered deep into the bedrock. I have never seen or heard of Hardits building on such a scale before. This was almost worthy of Trog architects at their most ambitious.
The fleshy outer shells of these Ultra Janissaries were already built; all they needed was the internal wiring. The existing Janissaries of the New Order were physically tough Hardit specimens, but their creation had centered on the removal of their gender, and the associated scent that underpinned natural Hardit society. As the Ottoman sultans of ancient Earth had created a corps of Janissary warriors so completely outside of society that they could not themselves become a rival to the sultan – or so the Ottoman rulers had thought – the Hardit Janissaries were so set apart from gendered Hardit society that they could be loyal only to the New Order and Tawfiq.
This new generation of Ultra Janissaries were physical giants of their race, not only on the outside with their tough hide and Marine-like muscles, but on the inside, their agoraphobia had been erased. These Janissaries wouldn’t need to be drugged to fly in air and in space. But the most important internal upgrade, as far as Tawfiq was concerned, was to their loyalty.
Their minds were physically complete, but their internal connections were still being wrought. Approximately fifteen years of learning and indoctrination was being compressed into just four weeks. And they were over halfway through.
They would remain barely functioning, Tawfiq explained, able to do little more than a stumbling walk under supervision until they were awakened in an imprinting ceremony. It would be like a hatching chick imprinting their loyalty for life, she told me, adding when she saw the hope blossom in my face, that they would only imprint when given the correct codes. Codes I would never get near.
She’s right. I won’t, but perhaps the Legion can. They have to try.
If they don’t, Tawfiq claims she’s already immortal, and with her new army rising from the bowels of the Earth to strike across the stars, she will rule the galaxy forever.
Five million Ultra Janissaries, bio-engineered super warriors with fanatical loyalty and enough war materials to make them a formidable army from the get go – that’s what’s coming in ten days, and it’s just the start. They’ll continue to crank out Ultra Janissaries by the million, and then they will build more vats. Soon the Earth will be a military factory, all non-Hardit life permitted on the planet will be reduced to farmed biomass fed into the engines of production.
I’m watched by armed guards every moment of day and night. I’m not permitted anywhere near a radio. The only person I can communicate with covertly is you, a telepathic orange blob in a glass tank. We have ten days to stop Tawfiq, Shepherdess. You must warn the Legion now.
No.
No? Are you crazy? They will kill you too soon enough, my friend.
Certainly, but I will not contact the Legion.
But… why not?
Reality has jumped already. A foe even greater than Tawfiq is interfering in the flow of time, but his work has unclouded my vision of what may come to pass. I can see through time once more, Romulus. I foresee that if I attempt radio contact with the Legion, I will be overheard and that will prevent vital events that must take place from ever occurring.
Vital events? Do they involve me? Is there something I must do?
Your time is over, Romulus. I am sorry, my friend. Only the manner of your death remains for you to choose. I speak of the human, McEwan, who once swore an oath to my people. The power of his oath has yet to unleash its potential and must be protected at all costs. I dare not contact the Legion, but there is one power left on Earth who may help. The entity is hidden well. Powerful, I think. And listening always, for a thousand years or more. I will contact it.
Who? Who is this?
I know only its name. Hortez.
— Chapter 22 —
Arun McEwan
The Nest
“You have nothing to fear from us, General McEwan,” said the military Trog lowered in submission on the revival chamber floor.
Arun looked incredulously, trying to spot the mouth p
arts. Pedro had always spoken through a translator device because Trogs had no speech organs whatsoever. This was no mechanical speech, though. Not any he recognized. The crazy ant even spoke with a Detroit accent.
“Both of you are safe, no thanks to this dumb drellock here.” The Trog soldier gave its comrade a hard shove. “I told you not to get too close without a rider.”
“I couldn’t help it,” said the other Trog. “I smelled the non-McEwan human and… I guess I frakking lost it. My bad.”
Arun willed the Trogs to shut up. He said nothing, not with his spoken voice, but the creatures swayed as if stunned by the power of his command.
“Let’s get this straight,” he said. “I’m communicating with you through pheromones, and that’s all thanks to the box Pedro stuck in my chest long ago.”
“Yes, General. Your scent authority pheromones speak to us far louder than your words. Speech is a much more recent innovation in our nest but lacks the authority of scent. Your venerable scent, General, is burnished with great age. You have been of the Nest for thousands of years.”
“Nest Hortez operates on pheromones,” explained the other Trog.
“Hortez?” queried Springer.
“Yes, Nest Hortez. The Great Parent regretted that no trace remained of his deceased human friend to add to the Nest scent. Only his human spoken name endured. As I was trying to explain, your scent, General, makes you overwhelmingly powerful, second only in aura to the Great Parent.”
“Pedro? You mean Pedro’s still alive after all these years?”
“Indeed, the Great Parent flourishes.”
“So, I’m his second-in-command. Is that how it works?”
“His…?”
“The great one often talks with fascination of your primitive gender assumptions,” explain the other Trog to its fellow. “He looks forward to reacquainting him-self with the ancient McEwan.”
“The Great Parent wishes you to command his armies. That is your purpose, and why you have been revived today. We have barely ten days left to defeat Tawfiq. If she is allowed to deploy her forthcoming army of super soldiers, then all hope is lost for the Nest and for your species.”
“Not now,” Arun growled. “Wait until later.”
“There will not be a later,” the Trog protested, anxiety about Arun’s lack of congruence blasting out of its scent glands. “Ten days. After that there is no hope.”
“No, not you,” Arun replied, “her.” He shrugged away Springer’s hand, which she had been rubbing over his chest.
“Are you copying this, Scipio?” Arun asked, grabbing Springer’s hand and putting it back on his torso.
“Loud and clear, sir.”
“Good. Life has a habit of going crazy around me. You’d better get used to it. I’ve just woken up after sleeping three thousand years with a Celtic goddess, and now I learn I’ve become queen and battlefield commander of an army of giant ants. Oh, and Tawfiq is going to kill everyone on the planet in ten days. Anyone up there still planning on following my orders?”
“I have already told you I shall, sir,” said the Jotun, which surprised Arun, because Jotuns liked their world neat and predictable. “Nhlappo has briefed me about you, and your status report is entirely in line with my expectations. It is an honor to serve with you, General McEwan. What is your plan?”
“We go back to where it all began for me. I know Trogs – they will have riddled this planet with their deep burrows, just as we planned. In fact… I can sense them. We fight in tunnels deep beneath the surface, and we’re going to keep going until we find Tawfiq. Then I’m going to kill her. Marchewka, I know tunnel war is not to the liking of Jotuns. Can I rely upon you?”
Across the link, he sensed the Jotun bristle with indignation. “It is indeed not to my liking, General, but the souls of my slaughtered enemies will tell you that I can wage war underground to devastating effect. We also have a contingent in our fleet who are tunnel warfare specialists. Tell me, sir, have you ever heard of a race called the Sangurians?”
“No,” he replied. “Never heard of…” His mouth dropped open, to see the Trogs of all caste types flailing their antennae in agitation.
“Mader zagh!” groaned one of the speaking Trogs.
“Chodding Sangurian tunnel bunnies,” said the other. “I don’t believe it!”
“Sangurians, you say…” Arun grinned. “Tell me more!”
“No!” Springer shouted. “I want you to all clear off and allow us a few moments of privacy.”
“Arun,” she whispered into his neck, “I never mentioned this but–” He flinched when she bit his ear. “When I wake from a long cryo, I come out… tense.”
Without needing Arun to shape his desires into words, the Trogs marched out of the chamber, one of the scribes carrying the comm cube from which Scipio’s laughter rang out.
Springer laid Arun onto his back and looked down at him from all fours. As her gaze drank in his body, her eyes lit up with an interior glow that made him ache with love for this unique woman.
“This won’t take long,” Arun called out to his waiting armies, as he pulled her down to kiss him.
— Chapter 23 —
Arun McEwan
Nest Hortez
The new Trog caste with the killer instincts turned out to be the equivalent of an armored warhorse. Not only was the head modified, but with the natural studs and ridges on its flanks, the abdomen was obviously designed to be swung as a club. And a groove traversed the thorax near to its join with the head. When Arun allowed one of the Trogs to lift him up onto the groove of the other, it was clear this was a seat complete with a hand rail growing from the creature’s carapace, flexible stirrups, attachment clips and view slits cut into the head crest that curved protectively around its rider. All of this had been programed into the creature’s genetic code. Unable to use stirrups himself, Arun’s Trog had a leather harness to secure him, which clipped into attachment points in the thorax casing.
As they proceeded through the Nest on the way to meet Pedro, Arun’s naked butt told him something else about his steed’s design. He was sitting on a natural gel cushion.
What no one could tell him was what the hell was going on topside in the liberation of Earth. Through his prolonged pheromone bullying of the scribes that accompanied them, he learned that he had been thawed a few days after the Saravanan drop pod had departed for Celtic Britannia, and not twenty-two years earlier in time to support Grace and the team aboard Karypsic in their attack on Tawfiq.
Why hadn’t he been thawed earlier? What had happened to his daughter’s mission? Even he couldn’t get that out of the scribes.
They passed through scenes reminiscent of his time as a cadet, when he’d been ordered to liaise with the Trogs beneath the Detroit base on Tranquility-4. The creatures came in many sizes and functions, metamorphosing from one life-stage to another, sometimes going back to repeat the previous stage, and sometimes moving forward, shedding intelligence as they progressed.
In many regards, Trogs were indeed like the ants they resembled: simple creatures following rudimentary biological programming. Nonetheless when the simple creatures were combined in groups, their behavior quickly spiraled into complex patterns. When necessary, their actions were nudged by pheromone orders from supervisors at a superior level of the nest hierarchy.
At some point on the journey, he realized his hand was clasping Springer’s. He couldn’t tell who was gripping harder.
They rode through dormitories, machine rooms, armories, laboratories, power plants, mess halls, and far more places whose function Arun couldn’t even guess.
At one point they passed through a viewing gallery that looked down on a sandy pit stained with gore. Arun thanked his luck that this wasn’t in use because he knew from Pedro’s descriptions long ago what this must be.
Pedro had always been obsessed about sex, and Arun’s life had apparently given him plenty of observable data. The Trog’s fascination stemmed from the lack of
gender on his home world, where sexual reproduction existed only in obscure plants, and then only under rare conditions.
Gender baffled the species, but physical lovemaking was the terrible heart of Trog life, even if sex might be the wrong word for it. They built arenas, such as the one Arun was traveling through, so you could watch your nest mates busy at it.
Pedro had often talked about romance, which was the creative wellspring of their culture precisely because love between Trogs was doomed to a brief flourishing between committed pairs before being ruthlessly cut down. Once Trogs fell in love, a relentless biological countdown began until, one day, it would be that pair’s turn on the sex arena floor. Lovemaking meant literally ripping into each other in no-holds-barred unarmed combat, in which reproductive organs were some of the principal weapons.
New lovers would invariably deny their fate to begin with. As the inevitability of their doom began to claim them, they would try to delay their destiny in the arena with plans that grew more desperate with every passing day, as the urge to fight slowly claimed them. They would write excruciatingly lengthy poems in which they expressed how their love was so strong, so uniquely special, that they would never yield to their cruel biology.
But, of course, they always did.
The act of mating was fatal for at least one of the combatant-lovers. The victor consumed their lover’s corpse, whose reproductive material would by then be within them. Bloated beyond belief, they would haul themselves to the birthing chambers where they wove themselves inside cocoons. Eventually they would emerge with renewed bodies and minds, and feral younglings would burst free at the same time to skitter through the Nest.
Arun sneaked a look at Springer who basked in the warmth of his attention. For all the complexities, inefficiencies, and heartache that human love had brought him, Arun was glad he wasn’t a Trog.
That was the thought uppermost in his mind when they finally came across Pedro himself in what Arun decided was a throne room.