Playing God (40 page)

This is crazy.
He leaned his head back against a strut and stared up at the rippling canvas ceiling.
This is completely crazy. My friends, my family are committing suicide out there, and I’m sitting here being jealous of Lynn’s…whoever.

Arron tried to find something else to think about. He couldn’t hear any of the town noise over the rumble of the engines and the rattle of struts. Shadows of buildings and traffic passed outside the canvas. He could smell the city smells of smog and fish and garbage and spices.

A shrieking roar sat him bolt upright. The carrier jerked to a halt. Other noises joined the shriek: a distant
boom
and
crump.

Oh, no.

“What!” exclaimed Resaime.

Lynn sat up, groggy but wide-eyed.

Arron scrambled to the rear of the carrier. Resaime scuttled aside. He undid one of the ties and raised the canvas.

The cloud blanket had broken to let some blue gleam through. The shriek began again and Arron saw the black wedges of warplanes streak across the sky. The
crump
and
boom
of the shore batteries split the city noises. Which meant more planes were coming.

A new shriek started, and nearby he heard a bang. His gaze jerked to a rooftop. Somebody had a rocket gun set up on a tripod. They fired it, and it went
bang!
with a flash and cloud of smoke, and the planes appeared overhead and a cloud of flame blossomed out of the side of one. A cheer went up, until one of the black wedges swooped back toward them.

Something dark fell from it. Reflex yanked Arron’s head and shoulders back into the carrier.

“Cover!” he shouted, curling into a ball, for all the good it would do.

The explosion was a thousand separate noises: crumbling stone, screams, crackling dust, rising fire, and tearing metal. The carrier rocked sideways, hard, wheels lifting up off the ground and slamming back down again.

The noise rolled on, but didn’t start over. Soon the sounds of shouting voices and running feet overwhelmed it.

One bomb, that was all. For the moment.

“What the hell?” demanded Lynn.

“Air raid.” Arron straightened up.

Lynn’s face went chalk white. “Oh, God. Res, are you—”

A wailing siren cut the air. “Shhhh.” Arron waved her quiet. The initial wail was followed by the slow, measured beating of a gong.

Res and Lynn stared at him. “Call to arms.” He slumped backwards. “There’s a war starting.”

“Out!” shouted Entsh from the cab.

“What?” said Lynn.

“Out! Out! We have to report for duty.”

“But we need…” began Arron.

“You need to find your own kind and get out of here,” said Balt. “We have to report, so you have to take your pet
devna
and go.”

Lynn opened her mouth again, but Arron laid a hand on her arm and shook his head. Not this time. Duty came first.

Arron climbed out of the carrier, followed by Lynn. Resaime, shaking all over, climbed out after them.

“Good luck,” shouted Balt as the carrier engine’s hum raised to a screaming pitch and it accelerated into the crowd, leaving them standing on the cracked pavement.

Everyone was running in different directions. Someone bumped into him, looked at him, and screamed. Arron tried to back away and collided with someone else, who shouted and shoved at him. A mother snatched a daughter out of his path. Someone shoved him sideways so hard he fell, hitting the pavement with his shoulder.

“Get away, Human!” she shouted.

He managed to look up and see Lynn. She and Res had made it into a doorway. Lynn stood over Resaime, shadowing Res with her body, so no one would see that the sister had the telltale blue tint to her skin that marked the t’Theria.

Arron got to his feet and forced a path over to Lynn and Res. He tried the handle on the door behind them. It gave, and the door opened onto a dim corridor.

No one needed any urging. Lynn and Res bundled inside.

The building was a market. Distribution stalls on one side, warehouse area on the other. Stairs ran up to the office area and quarters for the family who worked the place.

“Wait in here,” said Arron hurriedly. “Find something sturdy to get under and lie low. No one will be back until well after the attack’s over. I’m going to go find help.”

Lynn nodded mutely. Res dipped her ears. Her skin sagged so badly she looked like she was ready for the Change.

Arron made himself turn around and walk out the door.

The world outside had gone insane. The streets were jammed with people. The frame cars and carriers, stuffed with sisters, most of them armed, couldn’t move for the crowds, no matter how energetically the drivers shouted. The call to arms was now punctuated with general announcements. What snippets he could make out under the cacophony of the shore guns were about reporting to shelter or duty stations. He glanced up. Huge blue-and-grey multi-propped helicopters flew over the bay. He squinted toward the horizon and saw the black oblongs of distant war cruisers.

What’s happening? Who’s doing this?
Looking at the ’copters didn’t help. Straining to hear the PA announcements didn’t either.

Arron stood alone on the edge of the chaos. For the first time in ten years, he felt totally cut off from the world.

Get it together, Hagopian.

Balt and Entsh had said he should find his own kind. Right now, that wasn’t a bad idea. If he remembered right, Mrant Chavat was a fair-sized port. There might be a trader or embassite down on the quays. There might even be some Bioverse personnel. Somebody with a boat, or a van.

Arron raised his collar and hunched his neck down. He pulled his sleeves over his hands and clutched the hems from the inside so the cloth covered his hands. His trousers and boots were in one piece, which was something, but there was nothing he could do about his bare, hairy face, nothing he could do about a lot of things, except move fast.

One good thing, with an invasion on, Balt and Entsh’s employers probably won’t have the chance to grab us again.

Arron stepped into the mainstream of foot traffic. Mothers saw him and pulled up short, yanking their children into their arms and leaving holes in the crowd for him to duck through. People scrambled to get away from him, knocking down their mothers and sisters. Arron winced but let them fall. The only favor he could do everyone right now was get out of their way.

He headed west, hugging the buildings on the edge of the crowd, dodging past doorways as fast as he could to avoid the sisters charging down the stairs with their guns, or the mothers with their children and bundles. The constant roar of the guns was making his ears go numb, but now he heard a new sound. Water splashed somewhere to his right. He saw a narrow space between two buildings with light at its end. Arron turned himself sideways and slid into the crack. Chest and back scraping against rough concrete, he shinnied sideways through garbage, decaying leaves, and guano and out into the next street.

A quick glance showed he was in a crooked street that ran along the ridge of a sandy bank. Ladders led straight down to the docks. The grey-green harbor was choked with boats trying to get to shore. Some sisters just abandoned the vessels and ran for the shore, hopping from deck to deck. Some dived into the water and swam under the hulls. Out toward the mouth of the bay, the shore guns targeted the invading ships. The shells mostly landed in the water, raising huge gouts of foam, but here and there, Arron could see them hit the invaders’ decks, raising a gout of fire instead.

While the civilians tried to get inland to report to their shelters or militia units, the uniformed soldiers were heading for the water. Low, flat, armored transports lay waiting for them in the restricted areas of the harbor. Arron knew what was coming next. The soldiers were heading out to mine the harbor and to try to attach bombs to the hulls of the invading ships. They’d be joined by the troops who waited in the underwater bunkers, holed up like clams in their shells. The tunnels under the bay would be at least as busy as the docks, but probably more organized. Arms, supplies, and sisters would be shuttled to their stations.

The invaders, in turn, would send their own troops into the water to stop the troops and the mines and to destroy the bunkers.

A glint caught his eye and he saw, short and pale among the pinkish grey Dedelphi, a clean-suited Human arguing with a trio of soldiers. Ignoring the ladders, Arron half scrambled, half slid down the sandy slope. His boots hit the dock. Instantly, he was surrounded by a forest of shoulders and backs. He dodged his way through. All at once, he found himself in a still, clear spot, nose-to-nose with a familiar face.

“Cabal!”

The trader blinked, as if he was having trouble focusing. “Arron! What the hell are you still doing here?”

Got a year, Cabal?
“It’s a really long story. Have you got your boat?”

Cabal glowered at the soldiers. “I’m trying to find out.”

Arron looked up at the soldiers. Three ovrth, by the bands on their cuffs. “The light of day looks good on you, Sister Ovrth,” he said in his best, most formal Getesaph. “I am Scholar Arron Hagopian.”

“Scholar Arron?” The pinkest of the three held her ears up straighter. “What a delight to meet you. I wish the time permitted something other than a hasty greeting.”

Since Arron had no ears to dip, he bowed his head. “So do I. I came here to find Trader Cabal. Her boat is required to evacuate the remaining Humans from the danger area.”

Cabal gave him a startled look, but kept his mouth shut.

“The Humans have all been evacuated.
Bioverse
took care of that,” said Ovrth Pink.

“Not all.” Arron shook his head. “The last few need to be removed to a neutral island. Cabal has been authorized to take them out. I have come to find her.”

The ovrth looked dubious. “I do not want you to get in trouble, Sisters, but Bioverse will want to know why their personnel were endangered without cause,” added Arron.

Their ears all twitched uneasily. “The boat must be removed from the harbor,” said one with a crisscrossing of scars on the backs of her hands.

“Of course,” said Cabal. “As soon as possible.”

The shortest of the soldiers made some marks on Cabal’s harbor permit and handed it back to him. Cabal stuffed it into his pocket. He and Arron walked a ways down the dock, where the crowd had room to flow around them.

“I owe you for that,” said Cabal. “I tried to make one run too many. Missed my ride out. What happened to you?”

Arron’s tongue froze to the roof of his mouth. “There was a mix-up,” he said at last. “I need to get out.”

“No problem,” Cabal said easily. “I’m ready to go now.”

Arron held up his hands. “I’ve got a friend and a t’Therian who need to go with me.”

“A t’Therian!” Cabal’s voice dropped to a stage whisper. “Are you crazy? Those are the t’Therians out there!” He stabbed his finger toward the mouth of the harbor. “If the Getesaph catch her, she’s dead.”

“I know that,” said Arron flatly. “Do you think you could get us out to one of the warships?”

Cabal shook his head. “I do owe you, Arron, but making a run out to the enemy ships across an aquatic war zone, it is not worth it. It’s just not.”

Arron licked his lips. He should have known. Cabal had never been exactly altruistic. “What would make it worth it?”

“What?” Cabal’s forehead wrinkled.

“What would make it worth it?” asked Arron urgently. “My friend, she’s a senior with Bioverse. She can pull more strings than a nest of spiders. What would make the run worth it?”

The incredulity on Cabal’s face bled off into consideration. “A trip back to Sol.”

“Easy. There’s ships back and forth all the time.”

“You shouldn’t sound so desperate, Arron.” His mouth twisted. “It makes it hard to believe you can do what you’re saying.”

“Come on, Cabal.” Arron tried to force some easy camaraderie into his voice. “You know me.”

“Yeah, I do.” Arron was taken aback by the irony in his tone. “And I’ll bet you’re willing to swear to me she’s got pull with the Mars colony trade council, too.”

This time, Arron’s grin was completely genuine. “Let’s put it this way. Help me, and you’ll be saving one of the daughters of the founding family.”

Cabal gave a low whistle. “You’ve got a Shin t’Theria? Here? What have you been doing?”

“I told you, there was a mix-up.”

“Yeah, right. Okay,” Cabal looked across the harbor. The armored transports pulled away from the dock. Another flight of planes screamed overhead. “Okay, get them down here. I’ll get the engines going so we can get out fast. The more we delay, the uglier the way out is going to get.”

I’m with you there.
“Okay, but one thing, Cabal. Have you got any spare clean-suits on board?”

Cabal actually gave him a small smile. “Anything else, Mon-sewer?”

Arron shrugged. “A couple bottles of water and some carbo-protein rations, if you’ve got any. And a medikit.”

Cabal gave a startled laugh. “Suits and supplies and a suicide run. Hagopian, she’d better be Shin t’Theria.”

Arron grinned. “I swear on my doctoral thesis.”

“I suppose I can accept that,” Cabal sounded warier than Arron would have liked. “Okay, let’s get you your goodies.”

The planes were still flying when Arron emerged from Cabal’s boat, freshly clean-suited and with a backpack of supplies slung over his shoulder. He climbed the ladders up to the street and found his narrow pass-through. He was halfway along it, wincing as his helmet grated against the building’s cement walls, when he heard the whistle, the screams, the bass rumbles, and the multilayered sounds of destruction that meant the bombs had started falling on Mrant Chavat.

Arron cursed and tried to move faster. The cement dragged at his new clean-suit, slicing into the organic. Another bomb fell. The ground trembled, and the buildings on either side of him swayed. He cursed again and pulled himself out into the street

It was deserted. Everyone from this quarter was where they needed to be. He saw a dust cloud farther inland, and the remains of one of the major bridges. Firelight reflected on the buildings that still stood.