by Viki Storm
I’m heaving breaths as I push through the door to the monitoring room. At first, I think I must have accidentally ingested some of that verpap root too, because my eyes must be playing tricks.
Then I realize the macabre tableau is all too real.
The three Fendan sat-nav engineers are dead—their throats cut.
The monitoring screens and control panels have all been destroyed. Those two Kraxx bastards that swam in through the grate must have come in here to disable our surveillance systems. I sift through the broken panels and find one of the backup systems has recorded onto a hard disk. I sync it to my own comm-panel so it’ll stream the footage on my screen.
I scroll through it impatiently, then my heart sinks when I find what I knew I’d see.
One hour ago, while we were all in the Great Hall, the sky was lit up by a fleet of untold Kraxx warships.
But they’re not headed for the capitol this time.
They’re headed for the mines.
The hand on my shoulder is cold as ice. The fingers come to a pinprick point in something that seems harder and sharper than a fingernail. I turn around on legs that feel numb. My bladder loosens and a few drops of urine trickle down my leg.
I’ve never seen anything so horrifying in all my days.
Two Kraxx stand before me, close enough I can smell the tangy, metallic scent on their breath. They’re tall, towering over me. Their heads are the worst. Long, thin and flat. They’re plated in armor that’s as black and shiny as a cockroach exoskeleton. Two oily eyes stare out, seeming to focus on nothing. Their eyes have the dumb look of a bird or a grasshopper—as if there’s nothing but instinct behind those eyes. No thought. No feeling. No capacity to reason.
Just animal instinct.
But not to survive.
The instinct to destroy.
Their eyes are sunk into soft, black flesh underneath the grooved plating of their heads—their mouths seated further down. Their teeth—dear void, their teeth—are long, at least two inches. They come down to a fine point. But they don’t have a lot of teeth—there’s a finger-space of gap between each tooth. So they don’t get any meat stuck in their teeth, I think wildly.
“Stay in the room,” one of them says. I can understand them, but I’m not sure if it’s because my language procedure or if it’s because they’re speaking English. The Queen looks into their stony eyes and sets her jaw firmly.
“We will not,” she says. I admire her, but I’m not sure why she’s defying these giant, insectile beings.
“You will,” the Kraxx says. There is no anger, no rage—and it occurs to me, in a race where there is no anger or rage, there is also no joy or love. They’re devoid of anything that we consider a meaningful part of the human condition.
Whatever courage the Queen summoned to defy the Kraxx, that must have been it, because she seems to shrink three inches as she deflates in defeat. Her shoulders slump, her head hangs down. She wraps a protective arm around the princesses and herds them back into the store room.
“If you stay inside…” the Kraxx says.
“…and if the Imperator lays down all arms against us…” the second one adds.
“…you will not be harmed. A servant will bring you all manner of royal comforts.”
Their voices are so strange to my ears. It’s like hearing a tape recording of a robot.
“What if my husband will not lay down arms?” the Queen asks—and isn’t that a stupid question?
“Then the royal females will be impregnated with Kraxxoid egg sacs until your bellies are so swollen you cannot rise from bed.”
I know now that’s going to happen to us no matter what. Even if the Imperator does lay down arms, the Kraxx will deposit their eggs in every Fendan female on the planet. Because that’s what they do. They conquer and breed and destroy.
It’s what they tried to do on Earth many generations ago. The Zalaryns stopped them once—I just hope they can stop these fell creatures again.
“We’ll stay here,” I say. If I have to listen to their oddly blank voices for a minute longer, I think I’m going to go insane. Maybe I already am insane? Would I even know if I lost my sanity? I don’t think I would.
“Good,” they say in unison. Their two voices sound as one—they’re that much alike, their voices that flat and toneless.
The Kraxx step forward, their heavy boots landing on the stone at the same time. They’re acting with one hive-mind, I think. And that saps the hope from me. Because one or two of these things might be defeated. But if they are all united? If every individual Kraxx has the strength of the entire hive?
I step back into the storeroom and wait for the Kraxx to follow us in, to take out whatever phallic apparatuses they possess and start the true conquest of Fenda by sowing the wombs of the royal Fendan females with Kraxxoid seed.
But they shut the door. The bolts slide into place, one by one, and we are locked inside.
The girls are crying quietly and the Queen’s usually brown face looks as white as the carved alabaster ceiling.
“We have to get out of here,” I whisper. “Now, before the whole palace is overrun.”
“No,” the Queen says, shaking her head. “You heard what they said. If my husband surrenders, we’ll be fine.”
My words stick in my mouth, like I’ve taken too big of a bite of peanut butter straight from the spoon.
“We won’t,” I say. The Queen is trying to comfort the girls as best she can. Her trembling hand is stroking their shoulders, their hair, moving from one girl to the next. She’s trying to be strong for them—and the only way she can do so is by believing the lie that they’ll be safe if the Imperator surrenders.
Hope is so much deadlier than any blade or bomb.
“We are the Royal Family,” the Queen says.
“And the Royal Family is the first to be slaughtered during an invasion. I’m surprised you’re still alive. We need to go—now.” My eyes find the Queen’s. Her eyes are filled with tears that she’s trying desperately not to shed. I look at the girls, the five of them trembling and clutching each other. I won’t let them be desecrated. I will save them. I must atone for the last time I had children depending on me and I let them down. All those years ago, my cowardice prevailed.
But not today. Today I’ll save them, no matter what the cost.
“I can’t,” the Queen says. “I have faith in my husband.”
“So do I,” I say. “But I don’t have faith in the Kraxx.”
“Listen to her, mum,” Worra says. She’s clutching the little Fendan ragdoll that she sewed from scraps of fabric finer than anything I ever worked with on Earth. “She wants to help us.”
“Come,” I take the Queen’s hand and lead her towards the door. She’s squeezing her eyes shut and shaking her head back and forth, causing her nose to bob wildly. But she lets herself be led.
At the door, I examine the locks. Fendan technology is pretty advanced—to me, at least—but according to Ayvinx, it’s quite primitive. The planet is so rich from their qizo deposits, that their society never really felt the need for mechanics and engineers. I know how to pick these locks—we call them deadbolts on Earth. I’ve busted through scores of these back when I was Arachne and I invaded every textile factory and upscale tailor’s shop in New York.
Problem is, I need tools. I have a set of lock picks in my dwelling—a few custom pieces of steel that were made by a fellow miscreant for the specific task. I’m long out of use with them, however, as it’s almost always faster to just break a small window and sneak inside.
This isn’t going to work. I need to find another way out. I scan the perimeter of the storeroom and see that there’s a vent at the top of the wall. If I can get the grate off, the opening will be just big enough for me to wiggle through.
I get the girls to help me stack some of the old dusty boxes and I climb up. The grate is old, but it’s held in by four thick bolts. I pry my fingernails under the edge and pull.
The grate pops right off—so fast that I almost topple over backwards. There are four rotted, dusty holes were the bolts once were. The alabaster that was drilled into was crumbly and the threads on the bolts found no purchase.
“I’m going to go inside and see where it leads,” I whisper. I don’t know how far the sound will travel in this duct.
Just then, a huge spider scrambles towards me. It crawls across the back of my hand and I pull it back, flapping my hand wildly, trying to shake the creature off. It’s stuck to me by a thick tendril of its silk—and I see that it’s no ordinary spider. Its bloated abdomen is the size of a grape and it seems to have more than eight legs—maybe twelve.
“What was that?” Worra asks.
“Nothing,” I say. Just then, I hear something scratching in the ducts. An ear-melting screech like a knife on the surface of a porcelain plate. Like your fingernails on your arithmetic slate. Every inch of my skin shudders at the sound.
I don’t want to know what’s inside this duct—but I’m going to have to find out.
I take a deep breath and hoist myself up. I kick my feet and finally manage to swing them inside. It’s completely dark in there. I try to get my bearings. I’m a creature of the dark, after all. I am the spider.
I get on my hands and knees, knowing that I need to go left, towards the main corridor. I force my hands and knees to move—and not just to move, but to move fast.
The scratching is getting louder, but there’s nothing I can do. I have to get the Queen and her girls out of the storeroom. The scratching is louder—so loud my jaws are tingling and my stomach clenches into a fist. Something is crawling on the back of my neck. I flail my arms, batting at my skin trying to get it off. I think it’s gone, but I can feel the prickly ghosts of its footprints on my flesh.
Voices. Outside. I can’t understand them, but I hold still, not wanting them to be able to hear my progress down the vent shaft. It’s pitch black and I can’t see, but I can still hear that scratching—oh, yes. It’s so close that I can smell it now—a fetid, cheesy odor. The smell of rot and decay. The voices below are getting louder, the conversation more animated. It’s the Snarlaqs, I think. Their voices are higher, their language more truncated and clipped-sounding. I recognize a few words: ‘Queen,’ ‘time’ and ‘morning.’
The claw sinks deep into the tender underflesh of my wrist. I squeeze every muscle in my body in an attempt not to scream. The hooked claws get under my skin, rooting my arm to the spot. The coiled, rabid strength of this creature surprises me.
I try to shake it off, but I can hardly move my arm. I bat at it with my other hand, but my blows have no effect. I connect with its cool, tough hide, but it makes no difference.
Then the teeth. Little pinprick teeth—and so many of them. It feels like a saw blade tearing its way through the meat of my arm.
I am prepared for biting, for clawing, for gnashing and shaking.
I am not prepared for sucking. A wet, round maw latches onto my arm. I can feel the rhythmic, muscular pulses and it begins to suck. It sucks hard. I can feel the draw of my blood as it’s pulled towards the creature’s mouth.
I’m too stunned to scream, too stunned to do anything but tremble, clenched and sweating in the dark.
Its tongue—sweet void, its tongue—probes the wound and begins to massage my open veins, coaxing more nourishment from my lifeblood. I’m feeling faint. This thing is going to exsanguinate me.
I need to get it off.
I remember once, back when I was delivering some of my merchandise to a woman. She had a baby at her breast and told me to hold on while she put him in the crib. I watched as she popped her pinky finger into the baby’s mouth. “Gotta break the seal,” she told me with knowing, motherly wisdom shining in her smile. “Can’t just pull them off the tit—he’s on there so tight, I could dangle him off the second-story balcony and he’d just hang there, guzzling his milk.”
That was why I couldn’t get it off before. It was already latched.
I grope my hand in the dark and I feel the glutted, bloated body. I walk my fingers along its skin, the pain in my arm the only thing that’s keeping the revulsion from overtaking me. I feel around its maw—it’s a hard, round ring of solid muscle. It’s pulsing and contracting with every pull. Even though it’s dark, I close my eyes and jam my fingers under the sucker.
It breaks free with a pop and lets out a squeal of greedy indignation. It hisses at me, but I use this opportunity to swing my arm in a wide arc and bat it away from me. It hits the side of the duct with a sickening squelch. I start to scramble away, not caring if there are guardsmen underneath in the corridor. I’d rather take my chances with them than with that suckling creature.
I don’t know how long I crawl, but I get to a grate, pop it out, and let myself down. I seem to be in a deserted part of the palace. At least I get one piece of luck in this whole sorry day. I look down at my arm and its streaming blood. It oddly doesn’t hurt, and I think of how mosquitoes have something in their saliva that both numbs the skin and prevents the blood from clotting—so the insatiable pests can feast as long as they want. This wound is probably going to swell and itch like a mad bastard for the next month.
I creep down the hallway, ears almost sore from straining so hard for signs of approaching feet. No one sees me, and I make it back to the storeroom and get the Queen and her girls.
The Queen says she thinks that the pooray cellar is nearby and full and they can hide in the back, behind rows and rows of the casks. We get into the room and only then do I allow myself to rest for a moment. I’m covered in soot and blood and sweat—and even though it’s probably my imagination, I swear I can still smell the rotten aura of that creature.
I get back up and poke my head out the door. “Where are you going?” the Queens says. “We’ll hide in the back, behind all the barrels.”
“No,” I say. “I need to sound the alarm. No one knows that the Kraxx have infiltrated. No one knows that the Snarlaqs have orchestrated the whole thing. Who knows what scheme they’re working in the rest of the palace?”
“You can’t leave us,” Worra says.
“I have to,” I say—and that’s the truth. “Look how easily we were fooled. They could be doing this to every Fendan in the palace—every Fendan in the capitol.” I don’t voice my deepest fear: somewhere, a Snarlaq is telling Ayvinx that he’s been summoned to some palace room. Would he go? His warrior instincts are keen and he has no preconceived notions of the Snarlaqs’ loyalty or obedience. He mistrusts everyone—and hopefully that will save him.
“Go then,” the Queen says. “Sound the alarm. Get help.”
I leave without saying goodbye. It feels like bad luck.
I peek out into the corridor and find it’s blessedly empty. I tiptoe and try to make my way back to the staircase, hugging the walls, staying in the dark embrace of the shadows.
I’m not even sure what happens—but there’s suddenly a burning poke at the back of my neck.
And then everything is pure agony.
The sky is dark. I can see a few scant rays of sunlight, but it’s not even enough to cast shadows on the ground.
It’s not clouds that blot out the sun. It’s Kraxx ships.
There are many rebel Zalaryns as well, and some of the bastards I even recognize from my dealings in seedier places in the capitol. That doesn’t stop my anankah however. Not at all. Once you’ve turned traitor, you’re an equal-opportunity target for its blastwave.
And the ships keep coming.
They keep landing.
They keep slaughtering. The foot of the mines are littered with corpses. Some—but a precious, damnable too few—are Kraxx.
It’s like they are descending from some great unseen hive. An endless colony of soldiers to draw from, and endless pool of killers. The waves keep coming.
The only reason I can keep them at bay are the rocky cliffs that house the mines. They naturally close to a choke-point where the Kraxx and reb
els are forced into a narrow passageway, and can only come two at a time. Like that, I can cut them down before they get inside.
But they keep coming. Straight from the void itself, they keep coming.
It’s been hours—I think. It’s hard to keep track of anything.
Earlier, I handed my comm-panel to a Fendan and told him to contact King Xalax and tell him about the invasion. That was a long time ago, I think. Hard to say for sure. And that’s even if he was able to get somewhere safe and set up the comm antenna. Only if the Fendan was able to figure out how to work the damn thing. And then, only if no one vaporized him in the meantime. So many ifs that I know I cannot count on him, or that damned communication. But maybe he got through—and maybe Xalax was able to get that Green Ghost Army. I think about it—and then let out a snort of laughter despite myself. That’s the Kraxxoid prophecy—Lord Noxu can only be defeated by the Green Ghost Army.
“I should have worn a green ghost costume,” I say under my breath as I strike down another Kraxx.
The only thing that’s keeping me going—other than rote muscle memory, my brute violent nature taking over my limbs and conducting this murderous symphony—is knowing that if all the Kraxx are here, at the entrance to the mines, then they won’t be at the palace. Where Jula is.
That is, I hope they aren’t at the palace.
My muscles ache, and my head is throbbing with the sounds of weaponry, the screams of dying males, and the sound of spacecraft descending. But still, I keep on—and just when I think I can’t take anymore, there’s a light in the sky so bright that I have to look away.
For a split second I think good—the endless flood of ships has finally run dry.
But it’s not the sun.
It’s the lights of a warship. A Zalaryn warship. The long one, that fits a crew of two hundred males and the plunder from a half-score of planets.
It descends about a hundred yards in the distance, where there’s a flat pass in the craggy rock. The Kraxx hiss and click their strange cries of joy. If these beings are even capable of feeling joy. Whatever sick violence is in their hearts thrills to the prospect of more bloodshed.