by C M Weller
Voices whispered in the night as the Tu'atta slept, with no identifiable source. They whispered disjointed truths, about knowledge and murder, about plots against the fitful sleeper. He knew, because he finally isolated some of them in his own footage of his slumbering self.
Alarms went off without being set to do so. Frequently in the middle of the night.
Food stores were found full of evriyong.
It was almost as if...
Graak shied away from the thought, as if some malevolent spirit wants us to go away without harming the humans... but it lurked there, all the same. Were he in a better state of mind, he would have dismissed the idea out of hand.
Everyone knew that only the Tu'atta had worthwhile deities. Why else would the Tu'atta be ruling? If the humans even had a faith, then their deities were not doing them any favours.
He sent his Taan crew out to investigate and resolve today's disasters and went on a slow patrol around the main concourse. People were tense. He could see it in the way others carried themselves, hear it in the murmurs they thought he couldn't overhear. Smell it in the air. Feel it in the subtle vibrations of the deck under his feet.
One little spark was all it would take to set this powder-keg off.
And it was his job to keep it spark-free.
*
Simy could feel something was up. He didn't want to stay very far away from his human. His Sahra. Even when she was at home, he kept close to her. Hiding in the walls.
Something big was coming. Something bad.
As Eon, he had developed a sense for the mood of an installation. The mood of this place was turning... sick. Sahra's tricks were building up and driving the Tu'atta slowly crazy.
If it all spilled over at once, the entire station could go insane. Well, the Tu'atta portion of it. The formerly important portion of it. The bit that he used to think was necessary for civilized life.
The bit, now that he thought about it, that he was taught was necessary for civilized life. By the Tu'atta. Who also helpfully supplied him with a definition that boiled down to not the way the humans do things.
But he'd seen and heard different things to what the Tu'atta told him.
They said, these are uneducated animals. They said, they don't understand civilization. They said, they are only useful under limited conditions. They said, they are helpless without us. They said, we have scientific proof that they are lesser. They said, we have theistic proof that we must help them.
Then they did not educate them, nor civilize them, nor let them be useful. They did not let them be independent, nor allow them to rise beyond a point, nor let them help themselves.
They said the humans had no faith. But they had a different faith, one alien to the Tu'atta.
They said the humans had no culture. But the culture persisted where the Tu'atta could not or would not see.
They said the humans were inferior. But a human child and her friends were pulling the Tu'atta apart without spilling so much as one drop of human blood. Or, for that matter, killing very many Tu'atta.
She had caught and held tight to the idea that Tu'atta were replaceable when they died. The living had to be cared for. Rehabilitated. And that had a steeper price than new recruits.
And then they had to spend more on new recruits because the soldiers with more experience needed medical attention, psychotherapy, sleep, better nutrition, a mate and were otherwise not paying attention to their jobs, so more people were needed to do less.
More people needed food, wages, air, clothes, accommodation, transportation, training, information, recreation and, because Sahra's little tricks were still tricking them, more treatment, more assistants to help them to do the job they were signed up for in the first place.
As far as Simy was aware, the assistants' assistants had assistants. And it was looking like they were needing - no small surprise - assistants very soon.
Gossip amongst the Tu'atta held that some evil spirits wanted them to go away. Some were even planning to go AWOL. Some were planning on resigning in shame.
Alarmingly, many were opining that the entire station should be blown up as a bad idea.
He had no idea how to communicate this to his Sahra.
At first, it had hurt to have a voice. By now, it hurt to think of her look of betrayal when she discovered that he'd had a voice all along. He'd even stopped practicing both his human shape and Sahra's brand of sabotage.
He was sure some other human had spotted him.
Discovery was tantamount to death, because it would kill Sahra's soul.
He knew she believed she had one. Constant exposure to humans meant that he now knew more about them, their culture, their beliefs and their habits than any 'learned' Tu'atta who had to base their research on whatever their teacher told them to do. And never, ever, contradict their respected teacher. There were still Tu'atta doing papers on how the humans were lesser beings because their red blood cells lacked nuclei. About how the humans were unlikely freaks of nature because they therefore lacked DNA and shouldn't exist.
Simy knew such things were flights of Tu'atta fancy. The evidence pointed him in directions the Tu'atta never looked.
And therefore, he had to do what he could to keep the humans safe until someone figured out the truth. Which may well be an eternity.
Keeping the humans safe meant slowing down the rats. Slowing down the rats, alas, meant getting Sahra off her little stationary crusade.
He didn't know if it would work, but he had to try. For the first time in months, he made his human shape. Leaned carefully over her sleeping form, and spoke softly.
"You have to be careful," he said into her ear. "Please. Tone down your tricks before the whole station goes mad."
Sahra murmured in her sleep and rolled over, making him retreat into the tunnels.
Would it work? Could it work on humans?
Only time would tell.
*
Norm the Shadow wasn't wanted by the masters because he could only see things clear, up close. Sahra and the rebels found him useful for doing the neat, tiny work in the circuits they made to create their tricks on the masters. Norm the Shadow liked making the circuits and all the other rats contributed to his daily hauls. In return, he got more rats enlisted into the rat patrol. They all found more tricks to pull. More places to pull them. More things to use. More places to hide. More places to use.
It was getting big. They had almost every rat working on the station... working to sabotage it. They only left out the snitches.
Norm the Shadow didn't get much involved in anything more than the circuits. The others figured out what they were doing with them and he figured out how to put it all together and make it go every single time.
Right now, he was working on a tiny chip no bigger than his thumb. Put it in a master's nursery unit, and it would mess with the temperature settings. Those who wanted to hatch a girl got a boy. Those who wanted to hatch a boy got someone somewhere in the middle. And the readouts would stay the same.
Since most of the girl masters on the station were getting ready to lay an egg, there was a time limit on these. He had a process that was almost quick enough, but the rats wanted more. Lots more. What Norm the Shadow needed, he decided, was another him. Or someone like him. Someone who could see really up close. But the masters tended to get rid of the close-visioned folks unless they could fake seeing normally long enough to find a place to belong.
It was Norm the Shadow's biggest worry, before the rat patrol ganged up to help him out. They were even talking to the rebels about making sure he 'vanished' in their direction. The rebels would have him making circuits and chips like this for as long as he wanted. And that was just fine by Norm the Shadow.
Right now, the other rats were discussing what Eva kept saying was 'socio-political ramifications of systemic breakdowns' and what the rats all called 'tricks'.
"They all good," said the white blur that was Sahra. "I know they all good. All's I'm sayin' is
they gotta wait a bit. The masters is all in a flap, but we need t' get 'em flappin' the same way. We need a message."
"Like, 'let my people go'?"
"Yahbut... sumpin' as makes kinda sense. Sumpin' as puts the fright of God up 'em. Sumpin' as gets the grownups thinkin' a say-vyer is comin'."
Norm the Shadow did something he didn't usually do. He made a contribution. "Meany meany tech el up har-sin."
"What?"
"Meany meany tech el up har-sin," Norm the Shadow repeated. "It's a story from the really long-ago. When the angels and all were with God's people. God's people was being kept down an' all? So an angel wrote the words of fire on a wall f'r all the big bad higher-ups to see. Meany meany tech el up har-sin. It meant, you been weighed in the balance and found wanting."
"You have been weighed and found wanting..." Eva repeated. "Words enough to frighten them."
"We got chemicals that can ignite..." suggested Smiley.
"We need something with a time-delay factor. So people could put it on walls without burning themselves," said Raven.
"And someone to translate," added little Alis. "We be writin' in human, yeah?"
"Somewhere big. Somewhere public. Somewhere that's goin' scare th' pants off of 'em."
"Got a big restaurant opening happening next week. Can we come up with the flaming paint by then?"
*
It came down to little Alis and six other rats including Sahra. Little Alis, because he was skinny and small and light and the other six to hold him up on ropes because they were small enough to fit into the only way in that was near a wall.
Sahra had one foot braced in a side-vent and her arms wrapped in cabling. She could just see little Alis making the marks.
Yankee. Oscar. Uniform.
Hotel. Alpha. Victor. Echo.
Bravo. Echo. Echo. November.
Whiskey. Echo. India. Golf. Hotel. Echo. Delta.
Alpha. November. Delta.
Foxtrot. Oscar. Uniform. November Delta.
Whiskey. Alpha. November. Tango. India. November. Golf.
Little Alis used the hand-stamp for a stop and sealed up the paint and put the brush and the stamp in the bag that would stop them all from burning up on their way back.
"Yeev," prompted Sahra.
"Ho," the others, all pulling at once. Wrapping new cable around their wrists and bracing to go again.
Ten 'yeev's and 'ho's, and little Alis was able to climb up himself. Ari wrapped up the bag and the paint in a fire blanket, just in case.
"Ullyully uxin free," Sahra whispered.
Rats, rope, chemicals and tools were all gone in minutes.
*
It was all over the station in seconds. What didn't pass through Tu'atta mouths went easily through the humans'.
An angel had written words of fire on the wall.
Graak, among the first on the scene once the screaming began, was already hearing that some had actually seen the angel. One had even looked into the eyes on its wings.
Eyes in wings.
"My fault," confessed the human guest of the Majestrix herself, long may she reign; one of the traders from the elusive free colonies and suspected drug runner, smuggler and thief. "I told them it was the writing of the angels' fiery hand... and they all wanted to know what an angel looked like."
"No doubt you also provided a translation of that..." he boggled at the burning words, "writing?"
"Human alphabet. The free traders still teach their children. It says, you have been weighed and found wanting. It's... a passage from our holy books."
"Humans have a religion?"
"Oh yes. It's quite complicated. Our god is three entities in one. The all-seeing father, the forgiving son, and the ever-present spirit. Then there's the angels, which I've mentioned, and--"
Graak held up a hand. "Enough." He hadn't heard anything about how it was supposed to work, but it was already making his head hurt. He had had a bad night on a long string of bad nights. He had had to get food from the printer because all the restaurants and vendors had sold out of anything worth eating. It was either ration baggies or human chow... or printed food.
He could tell by the hangover that he had made a very, very bad decision.
The flames burned bright, without apparent fuel. And it didn't burn hot enough to activate the fire suppression systems. Which was a good thing, considering that the fire suppression systems would have automatically killed the Majestrix herself. Long may she reign. Since the first thing the clever space-based fire suppression systems took away from a conflagration was the air it needed to burn.
Which meant that this... angel... was guilty of attempted assassination of the ruler of five star systems.
And since he could not arrest, punish, or execute a figment of human imagination, he had to believe that something else had written those words.
Preferably a someone who he could track down and then eat their throat out.
The restaurant was cleared, now. The words still burned on the walls and no amount of personal effort with personal extinguishers had managed to put the flames out. Short of sealing the area and vacating evidence and air, there was nothing that would put them out.
There were human traces, here. Explained by the presence of the Majestrix's current favourite human guest. And her pets. And her entourage's pets. And some other high-class visitor's pets.
There was little smoke from the flaming letters, but they still smelled of chemicals. He couldn't name them, but he knew there was some variety of trickery going on.
The handprint, though... The handprint perplexed him.
It was larger than a human hand could ever grow. And it had too many fingers.
Nothing alive could make a print like that.
Therefore, nothing alive had.
Which meant that elaborate trickery had gone on without leaving a trace. Were it not for him isolating the sources of some, he too would be almost be ready to believe a malevolent spirit was at work.
"We're being judged! We're being judged by their gods!"
Graak straightened up and ran for the door. One of the higher commanders, guest of the party for the opening of the restaurant, had stripped off her uniform and was now running, naked, down the main concourse.
"They know! They know our secrets!"
Graak gestured for some trusted lowers to go catch her. "This must be a trick," he announced to the gawking audience. "The science officer and her staff can verify that this is the result of technological trickery."
"Om'r," said one of the Taans he'd set to guard the restaurant entrance, "That... was... the science officer."
Gods of mercy, come out of hiding... Graak did a subtle breathing exercise to calm his anger. "Find someone who can search for evidence and get them to do so. Run."
The young Taan fled.
Three Vashts finally tackled the naked science officer and threw a blanket over her nudity. Nothing could stop the spread of gossip, though. The head of the science division running naked down the main concourse and screaming about spirits.
That sort of thing got around.
Faster than light.
It was doubtless already going through the slave quarters.
An angel's flaming hand. Writing words that were both warning and portent of doom. Human words. Reflecting a story from human mythology that, frankly, Graak was wondering if the blasted mammals hadn't pulled out of thin air.
They were probably mimicking their masters and betters much more reasonable faith with their fabulous imaginings mixed with nightmares and horror stories from the Tu'atta's own, ancient pasts. Yes. That had to be it.
The Majestrix -long may she reign- had owned a young human who would not sleep until someone had verified that there were no demons hiding behind the curtains.
The fabrications of infantile minds. Turned into something that burned without fuel. And made no smoke.
*
Sahra kept her head down as she ate her lunch. Only Darvan knew she
could hear the grownups talk. He was lipreading a lot better, though. His gasps and laughter were happening at the right times, instead of a pulse or two behind.
Angels!
The word was all over.
Angels had found the Tu'atta to be wanting, and had warned them thus in words of fire!
Eighty feet tall!
They'd seen the angel!
It was two hundred feet tall!
With wings of fire!
And eyes that burned out the unbelievers' with their very gaze!
And the chief of science herself went completely mad and tore off her clothes!
Sahra had had to hide her laughter by pretending to choke on a lump. Just the idea of a naked master was hilarious. What the master was screaming about as she ran, naked, through a very public place was faithfully repeated from ear to ear. Even Dotti took time to tell Sahra with her hands.
She said that they are being judged by our god.
No doubt God and the Angels found the Tu'atta wanting. They had to have seen. They had to know that no Tu'atta followed the holy rules of peace.
But the hand of the angel...
Sahra and six others knew that that hand was the one of little Alis. With the help of Sahra and the others.
And in a very few months, the masters would find that they had been cursed with a rash of male children. Instead of a mob of girls, which the masters valued, they would be getting sons.
Less valuable sons. Unwanted sons. Indecisive, unreliable, unstable sons.
How many would be upset?
How many would think that this was a curse from the human's God?
Sahra decided to scope out the nursing creche, tonight. She had to see how tricky it was going to be, getting more letters of fire to happen where the masters nursed their babies.
The grownups were talking along the right lines, though. Was this the sign of an impending savior? Were miracles at hand? Were they going to throw off their oppressors' chains and regain their kingdom under the benevolent eye of God?
Some were even discussing 'helping' the savior along. Little things. Leaving pins in the clothing. Adding bad things to the masters' food. Singing repetitive hymns while they worked. Creatively obeying direct, if vague orders. Creatively disobeying direct orders.