D'Arc

by Robert Repino

  “Lower your weapons,” she said. “You’re making my ladies nervous.”

  Castor ordered everyone to stand down. To calm his trigger-happy friends, he vaulted the barricade and placed his rifle on the ground. Good, Falkirk thought. There might still be some hope for this rodent leader. Sheba’s ant bucked a little. She kicked the thorax to keep her still.

  Castor spoke softly with Sheba. Falkirk heard her say that she was there to help, and that she needed a place for the Alphas to stay. Falkirk did not catch the rest of it, and instead focused on Sheba’s faceless silhouette. When the flare fizzled out, her image remained burned into his retinas, a ghost that haunted him every time he blinked.

  Sheba discussed the plan with Castor, Nikaya, and Falkirk over a meal of insect stew and hot cider. Though awed by her presence, the beavers gasped when Sheba told them that Mort(e), at that very moment, was trying to recruit the bats. “We don’t need them,” Nikaya hissed. “We need real soldiers.” Falkirk reminded her that real soldiers used every advantage they could get. And besides, time was running out. Nikaya continued to object until Castor cut her off. “We need the bats,” he said. That settled it. When he asked what to do next, Sheba told him to get some rest. In the morning, the beavers would learn how to ride the ants like a cavalry. Castor nearly spit out his cider.

  At dawn, the Watchers gathered at the edge of the camp, where the ants stood in formation. Sheba sat on an Alpha, having shed her guns and ammunition in exchange for a utility vest and a wide-brimmed field hat. She explained that they would need only nine or ten mounted Alphas. The rest of them—about twenty or so—would follow the riders. Unencumbered, these ants would scale the spider’s defenses and attack in areas where the others could not.

  “The best riders will take an Alpha into battle,” Sheba told them. “Your ant will have to trust you the same way she trusted the Queen. You will be a queen. You’ll give orders. But you can’t hesitate. A queen never second-guesses herself. A queen never reverses course.”

  Sheba went over the basics of handling the animals. She started with tying the bridle to the mandible. Several of the beavers did it wrong, accidentally brushing the inside of the jaw. This triggered the muscles to clamp the mouth shut like a bear trap. The first three beavers who tried it failed, and each one jumped higher than the last when the jaw closed. Castor managed to do it correctly, only to have the beast lunge forward and knock him over. Sheba said that it was a sign of affection.

  She then showed them how to mount an Alpha. Though the thorax made for a convenient saddle, the portly beavers found it difficult to shimmy onto it. A few of them were able to climb on top, but their large rear ends made it almost impossible to sit straight. Sheba let them carry on like this a few times before intervening. The ants, for their part, knocked off the incompetent passengers with a shiver.

  Sheba’s patience resulted in a dozen beavers riding their own Alphas. Like astonished children playing with a new toy, they marveled at the size and strength of the ants.

  Falkirk could not stop watching her. All the legends and songs described Sheba the Mother as this nurturing, loving, docile canine. And there were hints of that in the way she doted on the ants. But this mother carried a sword, and called one of the beavers a fat ass when she caught him goofing around on his Alpha. In those early days of the Change, when Falkirk ventured into the white, he never could have imagined that the new world would produce someone like this.

  Sheba led the cavalry on a march through the forest. The ants walked in such perfect formation that all the riders bobbed in unison with each step. Riding the Alpha named Jomo, Falkirk ended up on Sheba’s left, with Castor directly behind him. On the other side, the beaver named Fram fussed with his mount, the ant occasionally bucking but staying on track. Falkirk’s Alpha barely seemed to notice his presence, choosing instead to probe the grass with her antennae. When the herd changed course, Sheba showed everyone how to direct the Alphas to the left. “You’re in charge,” she said. “But be respectful.”

  Though the beavers joked with one another about who was the best rider, their banter died out as they drew closer to the city. Falkirk could feel the dread building in them, the kind that only a parent who has lost a child could sense. Sheba made it to the precipice first. The morning fog lifted, exposing the city under the stark gray sky.

  Most of the beavers had not seen the city since the evacuation. Once they all cleared the trees, they formed a line and lowered their heads. Some of the Alphas did the same. Then the humming started. The song rang out—the same one Castor and Booker performed a few days earlier—full of woe and torment and regret. Sheba removed her hat and held it to her heart.

  The march continued. So did the singing. Falkirk pulled closer to Sheba at the front of the pack.

  “Chingachgook tried to teach me one of their songs,” she said.

  “The one about the lodges?” Falkirk joked.

  “No, the other one about the lodges.”

  The beavers executed a key change, and then laughed at how well they pulled it off.

  “So you changed Mort(e)’s mind,” Falkirk said. “What changed yours?”

  “I always wanted to help. So did Mort(e), really. He needed some time to come around.”

  “But why help? Mort(e)’s not completely wrong. The beavers expelled their only allies, expanded their territory too quickly. They may have even provoked that spider.”

  Sheba put her hat on and turned to the valley, to the dead city and the wilderness beyond. “We can’t hide forever,” she said.

  A strange, evasive answer, Falkirk thought. Before he could add anything else, she leaned over to him. “Tell me about your city. All its wonders.”

  He told her all he could. The interspecies council, the refugee camps run by the clerical orders, the dam project. Whereas settlements like Lodge City failed to integrate, Hosanna refused no one—all who entered the city became an ally. And the abundance promised in the days to come only attracted more migrants.

  “Mort(e) tells me that Hosanna is corrupt,” Sheba said. “You have satellites and airships, but you send only one person to save Lodge City?”

  “I didn’t say it was perfect.”

  Falkirk was tired of defending Hosanna from the skeptics who lived in the countryside. He wanted to say that one dog to rescue Lodge City was better than none. One killer on the loose was better than many. Only a few years into peacetime, and Hosanna accomplished more than the Colony had in this part of the world. Humans and animals joined forces there, ending the war for good.

  Rather than point these things out, Falkirk decided to tell her the truth.

  “As a matter of fact, people are scared,” he said.

  “Scared of what?”

  “Let me put it this way. The case number I’m working on for this spider attack is 0519. That means there are 518 cases before mine.”

  “Cases. You mean mutations.”

  “Yes. Most of them are harmless. But we don’t have the resources to address the ones that aren’t. And it turns out that the world is a big place. We have both a country and an ocean to explore. But we’ve been out of touch with the other continents for years. That’s what the expedition is for.”

  “What expedition?”

  My God, he thought. This dog—the Mother—had been isolated for too long. Even the wolves knew about the expedition, though they mocked it as another example of human arrogance.

  “The humans have salvaged a boat,” he said. “Probably the biggest one that still floats. They’re going to use it to explore the countries that went silent since the war.”

  The ship would sail the coast of South America, cross the Atlantic, then north along West Africa, into the mouth of the Mediterranean, and on to Europe. With each exotic place he named, Sheba became more animated. Her tail flipped from side to side.

  “How long will they be gone?”
she asked.

  “Officially, a year. Unofficially . . . as long as it takes.”

  Falkirk told her the name of the mission: al-Rihla, named for some human vessel from their so-called age of exploration.

  “Oh, that was Ibn Battuta’s ship!” she said.

  “Very good.”

  She mentioned that she spent her free time studying maritime history. When Falkirk admitted—to her disappointment—that he did not know the al-Rihla’s model, she speculated that it must have been a United States naval vessel. For someone with no real piloting skills, she could give intricate details about the ship’s design from the manuals and other books she’d found.

  “Do they still . . . need people?” Sheba asked.

  “I thought you liked it out here.”

  This embarrassed her. She swore she asked out of mere curiosity, but Falkirk could tell she was backpedaling.

  “They say the expedition is all booked up, save for a few spots,” Falkirk said. “But I have to tell you something. The city could use more people like you and Mort(e). I hope you understand that I sent word to Tranquility that I found you.”

  “You want to bring us simple folk to the city?”

  “Yes. You’d be treated like royalty.”

  Sheba laughed. The Alpha altered her stride to accommodate her shaking body. “You are so lucky the Old Man didn’t hear you say that.”

  “Hosanna is trying to recruit people like you,” Falkirk said. “We have an exchange program for law enforcement officials out on the frontier. They shadow a Tranquility agent for a few weeks. And then, if they want, they sign up for the academy.”

  “We’re not law enforcement.”

  “You’re close enough. Besides, people would listen to you. Even the humans.”

  The trail descended again, leading to a stream at the bottom of the valley, narrow enough for someone to jump across. Sheba told the beavers to keep a firm grip on the reins; otherwise, the ants would instinctively follow the flow of the water. She went first. Falkirk’s mount bucked once, but made it across. They waited as the rest of them gave it a try. Though no one fell off, a few nearly did. One Lodger bounced from the saddle and swung completely around. He grasped the ant’s neck while hanging upside down. The Alpha patiently waited while the beaver righted himself.

  Once everyone regrouped, the caravan moved on. Sheba rode next to Falkirk again. “Have you ever seen the ocean before?” she asked.

  “I’ve seen it from an airship. The water looks all polished.”

  He winced as soon as he said it. She didn’t ask him to brag.

  “I dream about it all the time,” she said. “But it always looks like paint. Or stone.”

  A horn blew in the distance. Brrrrrrrruhhh. The sound came from the camp. The convoy stopped to listen.

  “Another alarm?” Falkirk asked.

  “Yes,” Castor said. The horn blew again. “Two signals for spiders.”

  The horn blew a third time. “What does three mean?” Falkirk asked.

  “Bats.” Castor lowered his head, exhausted with all of this. Surely aware that everyone was waiting for him to respond, he willed himself to pull the reins of his mount. The Alpha’s antennae shot straight up. “Watchers, let’s go!”

  He forced the ant into a gallop. Falkirk and Sheba moved out of his way. The heavy footsteps tore out clumps of mud. Sheba dug her feet into her ant’s side and took off after him.

  “We’re not ready for full speed yet!” she yelled.

  “Let’s find out!” Castor said over his shoulder.

  Falkirk joined the charge. His eyes watered from the wind blowing in his face. He couldn’t believe how fast they could go. The cavalry soon resembled a train, with Castor pulling them along like the engine car.

  The beaver led them on a shortcut through the woods. The ants became an avalanche roaring down the hills. The beasts took over, weaving among the trees, planting their feet on the roots and leaping over ditches.

  “Bats!” someone screamed.

  Through the leaves and branches, Falkirk saw a shadow pass overhead. Definitely a bat. It squeaked several times, like a newborn rodent. When it circled again, Falkirk got a better view through a gap in the trees. Most likely a male, the bat had the wingspan of a hang glider, its brown wings nearly translucent, exposing the long finger bones that stretched from the wrist. The bat carried something in his hind legs—an Army-issue duffel bag. Instinctively, Falkirk barked, something he hadn’t done in a long time.

  The stampede broke free of the trees, entering a clearing within sight of the camp. The beavers inside readied the barricades, for whatever good they would do against a bombing run.

  “There!” someone yelled. “Over there!”

  More hypersonic noises bounced from the ground, pricking at Falkirk’s ears. The bat flew in a circle around the camp, the bag swinging like a pendulum.

  Several beavers ran from the defenses to greet Castor. One of them held out a rifle. Castor, to Falkirk’s continued surprise, snatched the weapon while riding at full speed. Sheba took the lead, directing the ants to form a line of defense. For the next few minutes, heads swiveled as they tracked the bat’s movement.

  Someone suggested taking a shot. “No,” Castor said. “This might be their olive branch.”

  A gust of wind nearly tipped the bat over, but he soon righted himself. In a series of arcs, the flyer descended until he gently rested the bag on the trail leading to the forest. The bat wore a leather aviator hat, with a fur brim and a set of polarized goggles. His enormous ears, like two sunflowers, protruded from holes cut into the cap.

  With the package delivered, the bat flew into the trees. In an effortless somersault, he perched upside down on a branch, wrapping his wings around his torso like a cocoon. His brown fur blended perfectly with the tree trunk. Only the light glinting from his goggles gave him away.

  The bag moved.

  Sighing, Sheba shook the reins on her Alpha to get her going.

  “Come on,” she said. “It’s safe.”

  Falkirk and Castor followed, ignoring the voices begging them to stay. When he got close enough, Falkirk could smell cat fur. Domesticated. The duffel bag rolled over and then stood vertically, with two boots sticking out of the opening. The person inside lifted the bag from his head. Exposed, Mort(e) squinted in the light, his whiskers seesawing with each sniff he took. As promised, the cat arrived fully armed, with a long rifle, a sidearm on his hip, and a vest festooned with ammunition and explosives.

  “I thought you hated to fly, Old Man,” Sheba said.

  “Still do.”

  Addressing him as Mort(e) the Warrior, Castor welcomed him to the camp. “Who is your friend?” he asked.

  “That is Mr. Gaunt of Thicktree, the proudest family of the Great Cloud and Protectors of the Sacred Forest.” Mort(e) turned to the bat. “Did I get that right?”

  The bat remained still. He may have been asleep.

  “That’s a yes,” Mort(e) said. “I think that’s a yes.”

  “The bats agreed to help us?” Castor asked.

  “One bat.”

  Castor’s mount took a few tentative steps toward the tree. The beaver said hello a few times. Mort(e) told him not to bother. Gaunt would speak when he wanted to, and even then it would be in Chiropteran, the cloud tongue—nothing but squeaks and chirps. “They’re funny that way,” Mort(e) said.

  “We mean them no harm.”

  “We’ll talk diplomacy later. We need to get moving.”

  “Did you go to the city?” Falkirk asked.

  “Yes. Did a few flybys. There are more eggs than we thought. Three of them are cracked. We have to take them out before they hatch.”

  Falkirk pictured it—spiderlings, each the size of a table, bursting from the pods, blindly hunting for food. They entered the world ready to ki
ll, and died only when they lost the ability to do so.

  “That’s why the spider kept the hostages alive,” Mort(e) said. “The young ones need something to eat when they hatch.”

  “I got it,” Castor said, checking to make sure no one in the camp heard that.

  “One more thing. The bats requested Nikaya’s presence at the battle.”

  “The matriarch? What for?”

  “She hates the bats. They figured that if she saw them saving the town firsthand, she’d change her mind about them.”

  “But she’s too old to travel.”

  “She’ll be fine. Do you want me to ask her myself?”

  Castor shifted in his saddle. “Okay. We’ll bring her. But she’ll be at a safe distance.”

  “Of course. Now get your people ready. Right now, I need to talk to Sheba. Alone.”

  Falkirk and Castor left them. At the entrance to the camp, the rest of the Watchers surrounded Castor, pelting him with questions. He tried to calm them. “This bat took a risk coming here,” he said. “Maybe the cloud is serious this time about working out a deal.”

  As they debated, a young beaver hopped over the wooden ramparts and ran to them. “Madame Nikaya wishes to speak with you,” she said.

  “I figured,” Castor said. “We’re working with the bats. It’s final.”

  “Should I tell her that?”

  “I’ll tell her.”

  Falkirk smiled. This beaver was starting to grow on him.

  An argument ensued. Castor maintained his calm, knowing that the rest of the villagers might hear. “The water flows,” he told them. Lodge City needed help, and the Messiah—the Messiah!—had found it. His comrades responded by going through the litany of crimes that the bats had committed. Theft. Vandalism. Desecrating the altar on their way out of Lodge City.

  “We don’t know it was them,” Castor said.

  “Who else would it be?”

  They began talking over one another. Falkirk lost interest. Instead, he fixated on Mort(e) standing on the trail. Though armed to the teeth, a walking instrument of death and mayhem, the cat gently stroked the head of the Alpha. Mort(e) gazed at Sheba the Mother, who sat tall in her saddle. When she laughed at something he said, tilting her head back so that her hat nearly fell off, Falkirk felt an intense wave of jealousy, like spiders crawling around in his guts. Mort(e) was chosen to become one with Sheba, as Falkirk was chosen for this fate. No use crying about it now. Not with so much work to do, so many hills to climb, so many chances to face death. The white takes you, his mother said. The white took everything, even the few fleeting moments with one of his own kind. But he was still here.