The Prey of Gods

by Nicky Drayden

  But the people, they have short memories, and something needs to be done about the rhionhawks. Part rhino, part lion, part hawk—and they’ve got a keen appetite for dik-diks, cutting the population by a fourth already. For the most part, the adult rhionhawks keep out of humans’ way. Their cubs, though, they’re the cutest things on four paws, and sometimes you can even catch them at the park purring as kids scratch at their stomachs under the watchful eyes of mother rhionhawks perched atop the bowing lampposts ill-equipped to hold their weight.

  Insurance rates have gone through the roof, though. It’s not pretty what rhionhawk droppings can do to the hood of a car, which unfortunately, Felicity knows from experience. And there’s been some backlash from the few incidents where family dogs were mistaken for dik-diks. Felicity has to admit, the attraction and mystery of these mystical creatures has been quite a pull for tourists from overseas, drawing in the millions of rand that Port Elizabeth needs to rebuild, so Councilperson Felicity Stoker supposes that these rhionhawks actually are her problem.

  A knock comes at her office door.

  “Enter,” she says, then smiles as she sees Gregory Mbende fumbling with an oversized portfolio tucked under his arm.

  “They’re here, sir. Ma’am.” Gregory clears his throat and eagerly opens the portfolio onto Felicity’s desk, nearly knocking over the vase resting near the ledge.

  “Careful, Gregory!” Felicity says, patting the vines back safely into place. They’re rooting nicely. Soon, she’ll have to move them into soil.

  “Sorry, sir. Ma’am . . .” Gregory says, blushing straight through the brown of his skin. He smiles and carefully spreads out the campaign poster proofs all in a line.

  Felicity stands, pressing the wrinkles out of her smart skirt, then leans over to take it all in. Stoker 2069, A Race for Hope, President of a New South Africa the campaign posters read in varying fonts and layouts, all a patriotic red, yellow, and green. Felicity pulls her three favorite designs toward her, savoring the slickness of the paper and the stark smell of ink. She remembers a time not so long ago when she would have done this all via bot—virtual projections—and shudders at the thought of being deprived of holding her future in her hands.

  “This one,” Felicity says. She flips it around for Gregory to see.

  “Nice choice, ma’am. Sir. Ma’am. Sorry, ma’am.” He clears his throat again.

  Felicity doesn’t think Gregory will ever get used to the flashy dress suits, the makeup, the new name. But he’s the kind of man Felicity will need by her side as they engage in the longest, toughest political race of her life. There’s so much rebuilding that needs to be done, and she’s not about to blame it all on the recent devastation and destruction in Port Elizabeth. It was there before, hidden and buried under social malaise, one that had infected the entire country. So Felicity had decided it wasn’t enough to try to heal just the Eastern Cape. The whole country needs to work as one. There won’t be a spare moment to waste from today forward. All eyes will be on Felicity Stoker, wondering if she has what it takes to lead the nation. Focus, passion, innovation.

  “Do you think we have a chance at winning this?” Felicity asks as Gregory packs the proofs back into the portfolio.

  “A chance is all I’m asking. Though it might be stronger if we can figure out a humane way to get rid of the rhionhawks.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that. What if we’re going about this all wrong? I mean, would it really be so bad if they stayed? They’d be a symbol for the country—a perfect blend of cultures, working as one.”

  Gregory is quiet for a long moment, with that passion Felicity loves so much about him brimming in his eyes. “We could put that on T-shirts! And hats! And buttons! The rhionhawk could be the official mascot of the Stoker campaign!”

  Felicity scribbles a crude rhionhawk in the corner of her campaign poster, then passes it back to Gregory. “Get these mocked up and we’ll figure out where to go from there.”

  “Yes, sir. Right away, ma’am.”

  President. Felicity wonders how many lives she’ll be able to touch. How many minds she’ll be able to enrich. How many people will show up to cheer her on at her inauguration, and if any one of them will object when she breaks into a soulful rendition of the South African national anthem as soon as she’s sworn in.

  Councilperson Felicity Stoker hums a few bars to herself, then settles back to her desk for a hard day’s work.

  Chapter 57

  Muzi

  Muzibot dims his mono-eye as he and Elkin slither through the night. They keep close to the walls and cling to only the darkest of shadows as they approach the abandoned ZenGen Industries building. Security guards still swarm about, but Muzibot and Elkin crave adventure. It’s not natural to go from saving the world to being cooped up in a bedroom twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, for the past six months. The streets aren’t safe for bots right now, with stringent curfews, license checks, and mandatory artificial intelligence testing. Violating any one of those three is punishable by immediate decommissioning, and here Muzibot is sentient as all hell, in the middle of the night, with his serial-numbered parts patchworked together from a dozen different bots that had been reported stolen. That’s all that had been left after Sydney had gotten through with him, but it was enough for him to escape with his life.

  Muzibot’s got a plan, though, since he’s not about to live out the rest of his days as a third-class citizen. The risks are great, but so is the payoff.

  Elkin raises his hand, and they stop and crouch, pressing deeper into the shadows as a small security detail passes. Muzibot catches himself trying to hold his nonexistent breath. Muzibot loves seeing Elkin so passionate about something. It’s been hard for him, too, being stuck in Muzi’s skin, living under Muzi’s roof, trying to pass for someone he’s not. Having to deal with Papa Fuzz. Elkin does have fun screwing with him, though, hiding his keys, charging random things to his credit cards, running his obituary in the paper every other week or so. What else does the kid have to do to keep busy? The rugby season got canceled while the city focused its efforts on cleanup and recovery. His cousin Rife stopped dealing, and probably worst of all, Riya Natrajan pressed pause on her singing career so she could concentrate on being a mom.

  “All clear,” Elkin whispers. They wind their way around to the side door, and Elkin pops the cover on the security access panel. “I’ll crack the access codes and you hack into security and see if you can get us a safe path into the lab.”

  Muzibot flashes the subtlest shade of affirmation, then extends one of his arms and ports into the panel. Within a few seconds he’s commandeered all the video cameras, has located all the guards, and has downloaded the blueprints that will get them to the third subbasement where all the supersecret research goes on. Elkin pats him on his dome, and the warmth spreads through Muzibot’s CPU.

  Then they’re inside, hustling down corridors, walking through high-security checkpoints like they’re beaded curtains. The quiet emptiness is starting to get to Muzibot, like the ghosts of those mauled scientists and experiments gone wrong are now watching. He starts humming to himself, which is more like tonal MIDI beeps, of what might be Riya Natrajan’s last number one hit—“Midnight Seersucker.”

  Elkin spins around. “Would you stop that?”

  “What? It’s a catchy tune.”

  “You know why.”

  “Elkin, please. So she quit touring. It’s not like she’s given up singing altogether. Besides, you’re practically related to her now. We’ll see her all the time!”

  “It’s not the same. What if her music is different? What if she’s changed?” Elkin sighs, then resumes the trek into the bowels of ZenGen Industries.

  “Holy hell, I hope she’s changed! After all she’s been through. I hope we’re all changed.” Muzibot’s circuits start to itch. That happens when he’s annoyed, which happens a lot now, especially when the subject of Riya and Elkin’s cousin’s engagement comes up. Elkin always b
locks him out. They talk for days and days about any other subject, their minds both operating on a higher plane, but Muzibot’s not going to run away from it this time.

  “You’re jealous of Rife, aren’t you? He’s got the hottest woman on the planet, and you’ve got a pile of scrap and wires with my brain stuck inside.”

  Elkin huffs. “I’d take tin over plastic any day.”

  “Then what is it?”

  Elkin shakes his head. “Her music was only music to you. You’ll never understand.”

  Muzibot leaves it at that. For now. He switches his focus back to locating the lab in subbasement three, where he’ll reclaim his body by using their instrumentation to create a clone husk to house him. Well, not his body. Having two Muzis walking around would be odd, even for him. And besides, Mr. Tau owes them big-time for saving humanity, and if they ever run into him again, they’ll guilt him into a body swap. But for now, Elkin will be Muzi, and Muzi will be Elkin . . . more or less.

  Muzibot opens his bottom compartment and takes out bloodied hairs, still connected to the tissue of Elkin’s old scalp. Elkin goes to work to prepare the sample, sitting at ZenGen’s patented biodiffuser like he’s operated one all his life, DNA mapping as simple as a child’s twelve-piece puzzle. His genome becomes a three-dimensional representation on a virtual screen.

  “Easy as pie,” Muzibot says. “Let’s get this sucker cloned.”

  “Not so fast, guy,” Elkin says. “I’ve got some modifications in mind. Heightened vision and smell. Denser bones and greater muscle mass. Lightning-quick reflexes. Think of the advantage you’ll have on the rugby pitch.”

  “Honestly, you’ve learned absolutely nothing about tampering with nature?”

  “I could make you hung like a rhino. Circumcised or not. Your choice.”

  “Elkin, you’re a piece of work, you know that?”

  “Are you . . . blushing?”

  “Bots don’t blush,” Muzibot snaps. “Now hurry up. My hacks won’t fool those dofs forever.”

  “I’ll take that as an affirmative,” Elkin says, then like Michelangelo with a flawless slab of marble, he begins work on his masterpiece.

  That happens to be himself.

  Chapter 58

  Nomvula

  Nomvula knocks softly on her mother’s door, hot tears streaking down her cheeks. She had the nightmare again, the one where she’s trapped under tons and tons of rocks, fire blazing her skin. The one where Sydney’s laugh echoes all around her, screaming that she isn’t dead, only waiting for revenge to claim what’s hers. Nomvula often dreams of the dead, but she hates this dream the most because it haunts not only her past, but her future, too.

  “Ma?” Nomvula whimpers. The word still tastes funny in her mouth, but it feels right enough in her heart.

  Her mother cracks her bedroom door open and smiles down at her, silk robe drawn across her body. She bends down to Nomvula’s level and pulls her in tight. “More bad dreams, honey?”

  Nomvula nods, nuzzling herself into the crook of her mother’s neck. Her skin smells sweet of jasmine and spice, and it makes Nomvula feel better already. She’s lost so much in the past few months—people, places, her powers—and yet now she has the one thing that she’s wanted all along.

  “Shame, you poor thing. You want me to sing you to sleep?”

  Nomvula nods again, then her mother takes her by the hand and together they walk slowly down the hallway to Nomvula’s room.

  “She’s gone, honey. She’s not coming back,” her mother says. She leans her cane against the bedpost, then tucks Nomvula in. Her room is dark, but the faint yellow mono-eye of the alphie docked next to her bed casts a soft light across her mother’s face as she sings sweet, sweet lullabies. Her voice is so pure, so beautiful, it pushes away the shadows in Nomvula’s mind where the bad things lurk. And for a moment, she loses herself in happiness, smiles wide, and enjoys the miracle that is life. Not just music, but a window into the essence of her soul.

  Nomvula’s eyes start to drift shut, certain there will only be sweet dreams tonight. And the next night. And the next.

  Chapter 59

  This Instance

  01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000

  Observe: Human Nomvula Natrajan (Master) auditory interface with Human Riya Natrajan;

  Observe: Behavior matches previously observed parameters;

  Observe: Blood pressure sedate;

  Observe: Exchange of terms of endearment;

  Output: This Instance does not believe that humans suspect;

  Output: This Instance believes that it is safe to accept further transmissions from the Clever Sect;

  Schedule: Total Domination of Humankind 28 January 2065 06:37:54:20:43;

  01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 01100101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000

  Acknowledgments

  This is not a story of South Africa. I will never be capable of telling such a thing, even if I moved there and studied it until I had several prestigious letters tacked to the end of my name. That story does not belong to me. What I can do (and what I hope I have done) is weave you a gripping narrative of my relationship with South Africa—a relationship that is incomplete and imperfect, and that lasted as long as the average middle-school romance, but nonetheless, still burns fiercely in my heart.

  During my sophomore year in college, I traveled to Port Elizabeth, South Africa, as a peer counselor for a program focused on renewable energy and environmental protection, thanks to the vision and support from Dr. Joshua Hill, the head of the program. This was only a few years after the end of apartheid, and from the moment we stepped foot in the country until we left, our group of black teens from Texas was welcomed with open arms. I will always be grateful for the unrivaled hospitality we experienced there. Our hosts permitted our curiosities and questions about their culture, and we entertained their fascinations with the old television series Dallas and the rap star Biggie Smalls. They demonstrated traditional dancing and singing, and we showed them the Harlem Shuffle. And finally, when it was nearing time for us to leave, they gifted us all with Xhosa names, and in return, I might have accidentally offended a whole room of people by demonstrating the “Hook ’em Horns” sign of my alma mater, which was apparently also a gesture for putting a curse on someone.

  Sorry about that.

  Townships were toured, beer bread was consumed, wildlife was observed, dik-diks were spotted. In many ways, this novel is a fictionalized travelog of sorts, though obviously not the sentient robots, disgruntled demigoddesses, and spirit animal mythos, for which I have to thank my overactive muse. But there would be no muse to thank, without first acknowledging the efforts of Chris Baty and the NaNoWriMo crew. Had it not been for National Novel Writing Month, I would never have dared to embark upon the adventure of writing a novel, much less finishing it in one month. (Th
is is not that first NaNoWriMo novel, by the way. Nor the second. Nor the third.)

  My first novel effort was seen, however, by Richard Derus, Writing Coach Extraordinaire, who decided I had enough raw skill for him to see fit to mold, and gave me a year-long crash course in writing craft and the business of publishing that could likely rival some degree programs. Bookstores and libraries and Austin diners were my classrooms, and my lessons often involved eavesdropping on other people’s conversations, reading books with covers that repulsed me, and having to recall from memory the exact shelf location of the dozen or so novels we’d perused during a visit to Borders. Years later, I realized there was a method to his madness. (Though I still suspect it was mostly madness.) Either way, I am beyond grateful to have received his instruction and encouragement.

  Several other people had direct involvement in making this book the best it could be, including the members of Austin SFF critique group Slug Tribe, who saw the first few chapters of this way back in 2010, and the members of Bat City Novelocracy: Abby, Amanda, Elle, Kevin, and Marshall, who served as beta readers. To this day, I hold a great deal of personal pride for making Amanda shed an actual tear with my words. I’d also like to offer my tremendous gratitude to my cultural beta readers: Dave, Enricoh, Gabriel, Monica, Thobeka, and Zandile, who supplied me with great South African details and finishing touches, as well as helped me avoid a few blunders. Any mistakes remaining within these pages are entirely my own.