The Venus Trap

by Paul Byatt

  Angel: Oh, shit...

  Chapter Seventeen

  Juanita trapped the ball expertly and dodged to one side of the attacker steaming towards her. With one more touch she pushed the ball slightly in front of her, then powered a cross-field ball over to The Princess, her hair providing a distraction to the defender in front of her – like everyone else on the Colombo team, they were still in a slight trance about who they were playing.

  The opening five minutes had been easy for the LP1 team of girls who had quickly raced into the lead whilst the human-only team had been seemingly dumbstruck at the situation they found themselves in. Football training and a determination to win the game had quickly asserted itself and they were beginning to show their quality. The Princess’ hair, though, was yet a diversion that they hadn’t adjusted to and so Chel sped past her as her hair feinted to go left whilst she went right. She looked up to see Carla, a year ten girl from Guatemala, bounding into the box, and hit a cross in that was only just over the head of the central American.

  “Ooh” s rung out from the appreciative crowd at the near miss. Coach Petr nodded his head in admiration even whilst he was desperately trying to remain as neutral as he could as the referee for the game. He was to referee the first half and his counterpart the second as a show of how everyone should be behaving in this attempt at a low-key friendly game. He blew for the goal-kick and eyed up the spectators.

  They all seemed to be enthusiastic without being rabidly screaming and shouting. The soldiers around the crowd were doing their level best to be professional, only occasionally stealing glances at the game. The Headmaster was sat with his opposite number and munching on yet another bacon sandwich – he had definitely gained weight, thought Petr, and would probably need to join in some of the PE lessons to get back to the lean boss he had been six weeks earlier.

  Ruth was smiling from ear to ear as she focussed on her daughter patrolling the defence. Thia seemed so small when compared to the older girls from Colombo but was holding her own. And she seemed to be enjoying herself. Truth be told, Ruth had not seen her daughter so animated and enthusiastic since New York. Thia had even taken to Steve, Colonel Rogers. She shook her head; she wasn’t supposed to be thinking some of the thoughts entering her head at the mention of the man in charge of security. She tore her brain back to the action on the pitch and involuntarily reached out a hand to the mother next to her – Merliengata’s – as ISC attacked down the right.

  Merliengata steeled herself for the inevitable cross coming her way, standing on her heels and noting the run of the big girl that Thia was trying to follow into the box. The ball came in, as expected, and she sprinted the way her coach had taught her. Argh! Too soon! She adjusted her feet quickly as the ball reached the zenith of its arc and threw up one arm to tip the ball inches away from the head of the attacker to run harmlessly away to where Juanita hoofed it unceremoniously upfield.

  Merliengata heard the clapping and shouting from the crowd and grinned. She could see Mr James up on his feet encouraging her and she smiled wider; this was it. This was why she had travelled that vast distance with her mother, to take part in something that no one had ever seen on any other planet. Sure, there were other games that they had experienced as part of the Hegemony’s Initial Contact Section, games that she had enjoyed but nothing like this. To think that this race of warring peoples had invented something so cool as this game astonished her. She laughed at herself as she remembered Thia trying to explain the term ‘cool’ to her and Chel.

  Major Baresi heard the “ooh”s from the crowd as he stood on the ramparts looking over at the much-reduced crowd of protesters outside the base – the aliens spread now all over the world had done nothing wrong. They had offended very few, had explained that many races and planets had gods of their own and were free to worship them, had offered many technological gifts and had not interfered in human politics so there seemed little to protest about. He had imparted the news of his team’s impending promotions and felt a jolt of pleasure at his wife’s news that they were expecting a second child.

  He noted the continuing security sweep from his wristpad, the updates on his hand-pad and the images of the crowd watching the game. He wished that he could have been there but he and his squad had a job to do even though nothing out of the ordinary was happening. He then tagged the phone call to his Spanish friend, Gustav, which was heavily encrypted and asking him to meet the spare parts for Mrs Chandra’s car that were arriving at the entrance to the base. He grimaced at the incredulous nature of Gustav’s replies, which he couldn’t follow clearly because his Spanish was rusty, but seemed to indicate that the driver had not ordered any spare parts and that none were needed. He pinged, via phone, the mightily annoyed Gustav to meet him at the entrance in five minutes.

  TBT via RelayTwo > Angel < Devil: It’s the Relays! This is the only one free of infection!

  Devil: How?

  Angel: Unknown. Check your localling DEV unit now! Infection stymied at fifth level on GMAT twelve. Agents beginning counter-measures. Effective within twelve seconds. Warnings given to Missioners. No action possible from Gate – Smatter outbreak contagious from Drone WEL/67 Sub 23.

  Devil: Confirmed. Ambassador en-route via emergency pod. Missioners declared evac locally or lockdown as per individual shuttle prerogatives. No known internal threats yet identified. What is going on here brother?

  Angel: Investigator warning on six levels of Refrohams. Think this is it twin. We are in the thick of it, as they would say here.

  Devil: The humans as bait; very clever.

  Angel: I agree. Long term planning extraordinary.

  Devil: But who brother? Who would do this?

  Angel: The Dehvkim! Signature from Gate received...

  Devil: My word! But surely they are too primitive to launch now?

  Angel: Wait one...

  Chapter Eighteen

  Coach Petr blew the whistle for half time. It was still one nil to the LP1 team over the Colombo team but only the cat-like reflexes of Merliengata had kept that scoreline. The older Colombo team had shed their nerves and excitement and had begun to pressure the younger alien/human team into errors that had led to a few decent chances.

  Both teams began to troop from the field drenched in sweat and to the accompaniment of lots of cheering from a non-partisan crowd that had seemingly enjoyed the fare on offer. Peter Hammersmith had just stood with his counterpart from Colombo, a Mrs Moir, and begun to applaud the two protagonists when the whole field shook violently and suddenly to the sound of a near-distant explosion. The Earth beneath the participants and spectators buckled, making even the Starship wobble slightly. A huge mushroom cloud began to build at the epicentre – the gates to the compound.

  Ruth Chandra stood stock still for a moment, her hand still attached to Merliengata’s mother’s arm. Terrible memories of the rioting that had overwhelmed the security of the UN in New York swam viciously through her head resurrecting demons she thought she had buried deep.

  Peter Hammersmith shuddered for a second before shouting the codeword “Smother!” over and over again, deafening the startled woman next to him. He screamed the only thing that he knew might overcome his worst nightmare and return him from being the quivering wreck that his body was beginning to become despite his anger.

  Coach Petr crouched instinctively; fight overcoming flight, searching for his pupils, mentally noting each of their positions on the field. His extensive training kicked in at the shout from his headteacher and he raced towards the farthermost of his charges, Merliengata. He became more livid with this nightmare scenario with each step he took towards his innocent goalkeeper, the rage boiling within him.

  Colonel Rogers began running towards the entrances as he simultaneously studied the sudden plethora of reports from his staff on his pads and recoiled from the blast front created so unexpectedly. He glanced impotently at Ruth who he was grimly happy to see was sprinting towards her shocked and angry daughter. This w
as not the time, he reasoned, and determinedly bolted towards the source of the smoke.

  Thia grabbed her friend Juanita at the sound of the explosion and started shaking uncontrollably. Not again, not again! She screamed one word, “Dad!”, and then, venting rage, yelled out the most vile curse word that she could. She and Juanita shared a moment with their eyes, full of fear and full of anger. They set their shoulders and looked around for something to take some sort of revenge upon. Someone would pay.

  The Princess sprinted towards her new Earth friends, both of whom had gone white. She really liked Juanita but Thia was the most important thing she had found after such a long journey, the one thing that meant the most to her, her friend who had already been driven to grief because of her and her brethren. The Princess Chelima was no shrinking violet; her hair had assumed a defensive-attack position whilst her two psi-linked taser-like weapons were already en-route to her under their own power from her quarters that she shared with her uncle and auntie. They would be in her hands in seven point six seconds. No one messed with her and her friends.

  Thursan powered up his suit to full defence mode, as he had been taught, along with several of his peers who had been trained in sudden attacks during the long journey from Prime Central those many years ago. He headed quickly towards the sound of the detonation using his anti-gravity function which made him float above the carnage he could see in front of him from ten feet below and awaited the delivery of his weapons, already speeding towards him from their storage in his apartment. He could see Seqwua doing the same and nodded to him in grim acceptance as they looked around at the gathering of now- angry visitor corps that he was a part. Someone would pay for this outrage; these were his friends who were being attacked!

  Jung Bin, trained in the paranoid world of South Korean fears of an attack from their northern neighbour, started to funnel the visiting team towards the sunken shelter only yards away from the pitch, a structure that doubled up as the changing rooms for athletes on the complex.

  Major Baresi spat smoke as he tried to rise from the floor using his elbows; his legs were just not responding. He could make out the splayed form of his friend Gustav, the brilliant Spanish goalkeeper and bodyguard, through the haze of debris and squall of a stinking air burnt crisp by whatever had been planted in the ‘official’ lorry supposedly delivering spare parts.

  Merliengata folded onto the turf and began to cry, her tears the bright pink typical of her race. She was suddenly back to her time on Cratus IV and her uncle dying in the flames of revolution when she was just four years old. She could see Coach Petr sprinting towards her, screaming unknown Czech curses and his face incandescent with rage at what had happened. He signalled her to duck down and she did so whilst simultaneously activating her personal protection devices left aboard the ship and already speeding towards her.

  Carlita Lopez felt nothing. She had been at the entrance awaiting a delegation of respected TES journalists eager to cover the induction of alien children into the educational world of the Earth. She had been annoyed at the timing of their arrival but couldn’t have possibly let Peter deal with it; he was just too nice to be distracted from his important role today. It was to be the last benign emotion she felt.

  Hundreds of protesters with an axe to grind - from Catalan Separatists, Islamic fundamentalists, Hindu fanatics, Sudanese refugees, Lithuanian Russians, Tibetan Monks to Christians arguing for equality in Indonesia - had heard the explosion and began telling the rest of the world about it from their vantage point five hundred yards away from the resultant rising plume of smoke.

  TBT > Angel < Devil: Treachery! Brother, beware!

  Angel: I see it! Cowardly! Attacking our hosts! Retribution, brother!

  Devil: Reciprocity protocols engaged. All DW’s deployed. Gate communicates simultaneous attack on Himga Nine.

  Angel: Multiple local casualties. EA engaged. Incoming!

  Devil: I see them.

  Angel: Stealth abandoned. FDP now!

  Devil: Doing so. Link in brother...

  Angel: Done. Good luck brother...

  Five Sri Lankan Paratroopers, the finest of their ilk, trained for any eventuality and detailed to be the first line of security, breathed nothing for evermore. The innocent driver of the lorry and the man he assumed was his friend met their end just as suddenly.

  Major Baresi’s squad reacted with the professional commitment expected of Secret Service personnel trained by Mossad and the SAS. After failing to get through to their superior the chain of command reverted to his wife, a second lieutenant, and they readied themselves for further attacks just as they called in medics to deal with the wounded.

  The command centre at LP1 lit up like Sydney Harbour Bridge on New Year’s Eve and every news channel on the planet sprang into action at the messages they were intercepting and receiving conventionally.

  Mr James ran towards the members of his class, human and alien, still reeling from the blast that had caused havoc in an unbelievably short space of time. He saw Thursan trying to power towards the rising plume of smoke, a look of pure determination on his face, and called out to him to stop even as he bounded down the steps of the grandstand that only minutes before had borne witness to something so marvellous. Incredibly, Thursan did indeed stop, as did several of his fellow visitors. They all descended to ground level as Mr James assumed some sort of control on his pupils.

  The hidden weapons of the spacecraft, codenamed Angel, that had delivered the visiting aliens raised itself quickly to thirty feet, the better to view and be viewed by all within the compound. The threats were confirmed as extra-terrestrial but involving local agents, probably in ignorance of whom they were really serving. This was an attempt by an outside body designed to bring chaos to the Hegemony, of that it was sure.

  For the moment it did not matter. Its mission was to protect its charges first and its hosts second. By all means necessary, that was the bottom line. The invisible force field around it had been enlarged to encompass the majority of the compound, thus limiting the extent of the gigantic explosion that had claimed the lives of many of its hosts at the entrance to the landing port.

  It reconfigured its powerful lasers towards the unidentified drones, activated from behind the ISS seemingly with perfect cloaking, that were approaching from fifty thousand feet and powered up its thrusters, preparing to leave the compound if it were necessary to protect those within it. It noted that its Mission Personnel were responding in their own fashions; some seeking shelter, some gunning up to match the threats now coming in from different levels – the sky and the ground. Their human hosts continued to show shock and awe at what had happened and what might about to befall them.

  Angel would do what it could to protect the humans currently fleeing into shelters that it had personally designed only two years earlier precisely in case of something such as this. It tracked the various personal weaponry now in the hands of its Missioners and gave a metaphorical nod of satisfaction that their training had kicked in so readily. A tiny part of it was still incredulous that a higher power would use its technology against these humans who were no danger to anyone save themselves. They did not deserve this; this was low and someone would find retribution swift and merciless for no one screwed with the Hegemony and got away with it.

  The AI aboard Angel, currently in ‘Come on then, let’s have it!’ mode was matched in its desires by its twin in far-away Ecuador which was powering away from two rogue Relays currently hurtling towards itself and towards one that was attempting to crash into Tokyo. They both launched their own drones on intercept vectors as well as silently making short work of two bands of attackers that had suddenly appeared from without both compounds. Slaughter would not begin to describe it. They were mere humans, used as cannon fodder distractions! This was too much.

  Angel felt another surge of what it would call anger. And the scent of the thrill of a battle. It was no longer the meek and mild transport vessel that its hosts wanted to believe it
to be. Now it was a brilliantly subtle warship, designed to fight and fight hard. This was its Raison D’être and it was not going to fail now. It was severely worried, elated, guilty, confident, eager but most of all it was bloody annoyed and wanted the traitors who had engineered this crisis to know it and pay for it. And pay they would. Dearly.