IGMS Issue 6 Page 7

  Nothing except Kallie.

  She couldn't allow this to happen, no matter what the Ohokwa might have done to her. She couldn't watch an entire village be murdered like dogs.

  Kallie crept forward, attempting to use her link to the queen to quell the anger. She allowed the emotion to travel from her like cool water spreading across a tiled floor.

  It was then that Nilawi brought the mug to her lips.

  "No!" Kallie shouted. She charged into the light.

  The room plunged into an eerie silence.

  Kallie raised her hands in a sign of peace. "Don't drink it." The moment Nilawi drank the liquid, another bond to the queen would be created, and when that happened it would be too much for Kallie to control. The queen's anger would bubble over like an unwatched pot.

  Nilawi pointed to Kallie and shouted commands in Ohokwa. Two of the nearly naked warriors advanced toward her.

  Using her bond in a new fashion, Kallie willed the dejda to protect her, an action not unlike pointing a finger. A dozen of the large beetles buzzed past her and landed on the warriors. The Ohokwa screamed as the beetles bit deep into legs and arms and chests. Several more warriors stepped forward to help, but Nilawi and Wattoha both screamed at them to remain where they were. A moment later, Kallie ordered the attacking beetles to her side as the warriors crawled to safety.

  A taut silence filled the room.

  The dejda queen's head shook and her mandibles clacked as she fought against the barrier Kallie's emotions had enforced upon her.

  "What have you done?" Wattoha asked with great care.

  A cackle broke the silence. Paheka pointed a crooked finger at Kallie. She whistled, low and trilling, and the dejda flew into the tunnel. Kallie ordered the beetles back to her side. They didn't return, but neither did they retreat further.

  For the moment, she and Paheka had reached a stalemate.

  "It's the queen," Kallie said quickly. "She's going to destroy you."

  Nilawi's face turned red and angry. She stalked forward, but Wattoha stalled her. "What do you mean?" Wattoha asked.

  "Bah!" Paheka limped forward and she shouted to Nilawi in Ohokwa.

  Nilawi eyed the mug she'd left on the floor. She took a step toward it, but at a word from Wattoha the warriors stopped her. As Nilawi struggled, Wattoha turned to Kallie.

  "Tell me what you mean," Wattoha said, her face rigid with a suppressed rage.

  "You know the queen has bonded with me for some reason."

  Nilawi shouted in Ohokwa.

  "I can feel her hatred," Kallie continued. "I can feel her hunger. She will not be controlled as her ancestors have for ages beyond count. She will destroy you --" Kallie pointed to the mug near Nilawi's feet "-- and all it will take is a sip of the queen's milk."

  Wattoha considered Kallie, and then turned to the queen. Kallie felt a probing from Wattoha. She was trying to ascertain the truth of Kallie's claims, but as she'd suspected the Ohokwa Queen was too weak to have any real understanding of Goheshdekana's intent.

  With the room's attention held, Paheka stood upright and pointed to Nilawi and the warriors holding her. Kallie felt Paheka's fury wash over her. The cavern wailed with the rattle of dejda. A swarm of them overtook the two warriors. They released Nilawi in a vain attempt at self defense.

  Nilawi launched herself at the mug and downed as much of the liquid as she could manage.

  The call of the dejda was like an explosion in Kallie's mind. She fell to the ground, unable to mount even the feeblest of counters.

  Nilawi screamed. Kallie could only assume the same thing was happening to her.

  All around the cavern, beetles flew. Landed. Stung. The Ohokwa cried with surprise and pain and anger. The women fled, though most of them did so with a dozen dejda crawling over their bodies. The warriors attempted to counterattack, but most dropped to the ground moments later, writhing in pain.

  Paheka reared back and clapped, laughing shrilly as Wattoha and Iye crumpled to the ground. She pointed and smiled insanely at the carnage before her. The dejda swarmed everywhere, obscuring Kallie's vision, but they were clearly leaving Paheka, Nilawi, and Kallie alone.

  An axe slipped free from a fallen warrior's grasp and clattered to the ground near Kallie's feet. She took it up immediately and charged. Paheka's eyes widened and she laughed even more while pointing a crooked finger in Kallie's direction.

  Kallie came down as hard as she could on the back of the queen's head.

  A sickening crunch rose above the buzzing call of the beetles.

  Paheka collapsed, lifeless. The beetles fell to the ground, still moving, but most had ceased their high-pitched rattle.

  Kallie breathed heavily, ready to strike again, but the queen lay utterly still. Nilawi stared up at Kallie with wide eyes, crazed eyes, but then something behind Kallie captured Nilawi's attention.

  Kallie spun around.

  The undulating form of the hatchling queen's cocoon shivered. Glistening mandibles ripped at the casing, and it was then that Kallie realized her connection to the queen hadn't been severed. It persisted. She stood confused for long moments, but understanding came as the new queen crawled from its birthing chamber and flexed her huge wing cases.

  Kallie had never been connected to Goheshdekana -- at least, it hadn't been completely so. It had been the growing mind of the new queen that had connected with her in the desert, that Kallie had nurtured with the thoughts and emotions of a settler.

  She took a step forward, brandishing the axe, but the young queen clicked her mandibles, and many of the warrior dejda whirred around Kallie. Kallie considered charging forward anyway, but at the mere thought, a half-dozen of them landed on her hair and chest and stomach. She dropped the axe and tried to shake them away, ineffectually. Only when she'd retreated to Nilawi's side did they free themselves from her and return to their queen's side.

  Even as the cries of dying Ohokwa echoed through the passageways behind them, the young queen stared on, jubilant.

  The queen didn't have to use words for Kallie to know that she and Nilawi were being allowed to leave. Nilawi seemed not to care, however. She was on her knees, crying, caressing her mother's cheek. Kallie tugged at her, gently at first, but then with force, until finally Nilawi stood and followed her out of the cavern.

  The last Kallie saw of the young queen was her moving to the dead queen's body and biting into the gooey flesh of her engorged abdomen. Her brood quickly followed suit.

  The flatbed wagon rocked and jingled as it trekked eastward and the morning heat intensified. Kallie rode in the rear, watching the second wagon and the horses that followed.

  She coughed, once, knowing that her consumption had been cured -- some small gift in payment for leading the queen to the plane of consciousness. She felt no relief, however, for the mind of the queen was still with her, crowding the back of her mind. She wanted to scrape it clean, to start over, but she knew the feeling would be with her until either she or the dejda queen was dead.

  Kallie regarded Nilawi, who met her gaze with a strange mixture of fear and defiance and apology. Kallie could feel Nilawi -- their common link to the queen granted each a faint but clear empathy of the other. Kallie tried to smile, but was sure she'd failed miserably. Nilawi's face hardened as she turned to study the cloud of beetles swarming above the gorge.

  Six Ohokwa children rode with them, all of them dazed, many staring with anxious eyes toward the gorge.

  God in Heaven, Kallie thought as she looked over the children, two wagons and four horses -- nineteen Ohokwa tribesmen, all told. Nineteen from a village of, what, four hundred?

  The dejda could have killed them all, including Kallie. The young queen had granted some small amount of mercy. Either that or she wished word of her transcendence to travel as the Ohokwa survivors flew east to Shaukauna lands, unwilling heralds to the new power rising in the desert.

  It was clear the future of tribesmen and settlers alike had been forever changed, but Kallie tried t
o console herself -- perhaps the dejda would be satisfied with owning the gorge, or perhaps just the desert.

  Kallie hugged her stomach tighter as memories flooded her mind. Please, God, let her be satisfied with the gorge.

  The fourth time I woke, I found myself.

  Mine eyes have opened, my children, and never shall they close again.

  Great Mother, Great Father

  by William Saxton

  Artwork by Dean Spencer

  * * *

  The first chief of the Rapahoah Empire forced stranded time-travelers to use their technical skills to make his people great, setting his Empire on the path to build ships, airplanes and bombs, to spread the worship of the Great Mother and subdue first the rest of North America and then the world.

  Two centuries later, Europe, Asia and Africa were independent again, no longer paying the tribute of sacrificial victims; but North America continued the blood sacrifices. To appease the Great Mother, certainly, but mostly to honor her wisdom. The Great Mother is too capricious to be appeased for long, as the city of Southport, bludgeoned by a hurricane and flooded with Mississippi water, had reason to know.

  The day after the storm, Tzichem, an officer of the Southport Police Force, risked going out for supplies. He took his wife Dikayah and their baby boy with him. The city was in anarchy, and there was no way he was going to leave them at home alone.

  In the flooded lot of a supermarket, they saw a crowd trying to break in.

  "We aren't going into that," Tzichem told Dikayah. Too dangerous.

  "We have to get something for Pio," Dikayah said. "We're down to the last jar of formula." Pio, the baby, cooed up at her from her shoulder harness. Her eyes glistened, and Tzichem . . . seeing her cry made Tzichem want to put his fist through a wall.

  He turned away and scanned the crowd. "They'll either break in, in which case we'll follow, or else the company's salvagers will come." He sighed. "And we'll leave."

  "Why would we leave?" she said. "You're a policeman. Tell them! Tell them you can help!"

  "We'll see," he said, meaning, let's not argue.

  Glass shattered in the storefront. The crowd surged into the supermarket.

  "Let's go," Tzichem said. There'd be formula inside. There'd be clean water . . . they went as fast as they could in the knee-deep water: a slow walk.

  As they came to the storefront, with other stragglers, Tzichem heard an engine.

  A speedboat came into view. Store employees, soldiers in the livery of the nobleman who ran it, bristling with guns.

  Tzichem and Dikayah changed course abruptly, away from the storefront, water swirling around their legs. Others jostled into them, trying to get clear of the path between the boat and the shattered storefront. Tzichem found himself and Dikayah directly in the boat's path.

  He moved back with her, keeping his hands in plain view. The security force ignored him.

  They put on gas masks. Oh, Great Mother, it wasn't just body armor; they were going to gas the building.

  The soldiers fired something into the store.

  People came boiling out. The fact that they could suggested that the gas wasn't lethal. Or maybe no one was willing to find out. The soldiers, too late, backed the boat away from the shattered storefront, letting the crowd escape.

  A man slammed into Dikayah, knocking her over. Tzichem reached for her; she scrambled to right herself, grabbed onto the side of the soldier's boat --

  "No!" Tzichem yelled --

  He heard the gunfire. People screamed; Tzichem pulled Dikayah to him. The water was still brown, but now had a tinge of red.

  The bullethole was in her head. Oh, Great Mother . . .

  Pio was no longer in her arms.

  He couldn't keep her upright and look for the baby. He couldn't . . . he let her go. He looked around. Looters were fleeing; cardboard boxes and plastic wrap floated in the muddy water -- but there was no bundle of white that would be Pio.

  The boat moved to the edge of the lot, presumably to let the crowd disperse.

  He still couldn't find Pio.

  Then he saw something white, floating. He forced his way through the muddy water to get to it.

  He was too late. Pio had taken a blow to the head -- maybe the boat, maybe a propeller. The hand of the Great Mother, whatever tool she used.

  The crowd was mostly gone, and the soldiers were coming back in. Their lord would have his store back mostly intact.

  Tzichem felt a wash of rage. Impotent rage: they'd shoot him if he approached. There was nothing he could do to them.

  Or for Dikayah and Pio. He had brought them to their deaths. It was his fault. Oh, Dikayah, he thought, I'm so sorry, so sorry . . .

  He couldn't stop his grieving, but he could take action despite it. He put on the shoulder harness and laid Pio in it. Then he took Dikayah's body and left. Caring for an empty shell when the soul was gone: showing the world his heresy. A wise man would be stoic. A wise man would know that death is part of life.

  He couldn't carry them throughout the day. He found an abandoned apartment with only its windows shattered by the hurricane, and laid Dikayah's body on a clean bed with Pio in her arms. They looked so peaceful . . . he let the tears come, racking sobs that shook him.

  He knew what the afterlife would be for them. The Mother would surely disdain them as victims and give them to her demons . . . oh, Great Mother, he prayed, don't let them suffer for my mistakes. Don't let them suffer. He knew the Mother would hold him in contempt for such a prayer; still he asked.

  When the First Father came to the Great Mother's bedchamber, he knew nothing of the danger. The Mother's demons seized him and the Mother devoured him. "He will feed me," she said. "He is good for nothing else."

  Heading out of the city -- there was nothing to stay for -- took him past the British consulate, its windows shattered and girders twisted by the Mother's fury. A pale-faced foreigner struggled with a shattered door. Tzichem kept going, through the knee-deep water.

  Tzichem's right foot slipped, and went deep into a hole. He took in a mouthful of water; something pierced his foot, right through the shoe.

  He struggled to free himself, but his foot was caught. He breathed water. He should be brave -- he shouldn't struggle -- he couldn't stop himself. His lungs felt about to burst.

  Eventually he stopped struggling. It was a relief.

  He felt something moving his foot, but he could no longer resist. Then someone was pulling him backward, arms gripping around his chest.

  Somehow he was on a dry place, retching and coughing out water.

  There was someone sitting beside him, looking over his bare foot. It was the pale man he'd just seen. They were in the consulate building, then. What was left of it.

  The man saw Tzichem looking at him. "You're welcome," the man said wryly. It wasn't a European accent; the man was surely North American, a descendant of the time travelers. "Raiders," they called themselves, after something from their bloodless "football" games.

  "How bad?" Tzichem said.

  "The ankle's already starting to swell," the man said. "And you've got a hole almost through the foot. That's not good."

  It certainly wasn't. The wound would almost certainly get infected. Tzichem looked out at the brown water covering the street. "'Water of life,'" he said. Like the water of the underworld, which both seethes with noisome life and kills those who fall into it.

  The man snorted. "If that's what you want to call it," he said. "We'd better get this sterilized." He took out a bottle. "This is going to sting a little," he said gruffly.

  If Tzichem could endure what had already happened, he could surely endure mere physical pain. He steeled himself, and let out no more than a grunt when the whiskey touched the wound.

  Tzichem's foot was cleaned, bandaged and wrapped in a garbage bag, to keep out some of the dirty water.

  The man's name was Ira; he looked to be about thirty. "You're not consulate staff," Tzichem said. Not with that accent.
<
br />   "No," Ira said. "I'm a copier repairman. I contract here sometimes." He looked over the wound. "We've got to get you out of here."

  "Why?" Ira didn't owe him anything.

  "Tetanus, for one thing. You need treatment."

  A good reason, to be sure. "I meant, why help me? You don't even know me," Tzichem said.

  Ira sat back on his haunches and stared, so that Tzichem feared he was reconsidering whether to abandon him. If that happened Tzichem might well die. Not necessarily a bad thing.

  "'The Lord delights in mercy,'" Ira said finally.

  "What?"

  "That's from one of the prophets. Our prophets, that is, the Jewish ones."

  Tzichem lost interest. "Slave religion," he said.

  "You're not upper class either," Ira said. "If you were, you'd have been evacuated before the hurricane." Ira pointed to the police insignia on Tzichem's uniform. "You're a policeman. Why weren't you evacuated?"

  "They said the buses were full," Tzichem said through clenched teeth. And why were he and his family at the end of the list? Because he was of the Lassamatchee tribe, not native Rapahoahan. Tzichem was sure of it.

  "The elite got out," Ira said, "and left you behind."

  "'He who is indifferent to suffering, in himself, in others, and in the Mother: such a man can rule in life and beyond,'" Tzichem quoted. It was an ideal any wise man would follow. "You, on the other hand, will be in hell itself, because you are foolish."

  "Jews don't believe in hell," Ira said. "At least I don't. Although I've seen enough here, I probably should."

  Tzichem felt a pang of guilt for his own lack of ruthlessness. He shouldn't try to convince Ira. He should be using him. Weak, weak, weak.