Dirge Read online

  “If you want to insult me you’ll have to do better than that.” Behind him, Adjami noted that Hathvupredek had quietly slipped off her bench and had begun to edge backward, toward the portal that led down into the hive.

  Grunting an expletive, the armed intruder roughly shoved Adjami aside. The diplomat stumbled but managed to maintain his balance. Several of the trespassing humans had already hurried on ahead to cut off the councilor’s retreat. Adjami’s eyes grew wide as the full implications of what he was seeing sunk in.

  “What do you think you’re doing? This is a restricted, controlled area. I am Adjami L’Hafira, an elected representative to the world council! Leave at once before you force me to summon Reserva Security.”

  Looking him up and down, the man grinned unpleasantly. “With what? I don’t see a communicator.” With the muzzle of his rifle he gestured in Hathvupredek’s direction. “You’re just out for a morning stroll with your favorite roach, ain’t you? Dirty bug lover. Traitor.”

  Fanatics, Adjami realized. These were the most extreme representatives of the sizable xenophobic contingent that was opposed to any human-thranx rapprochement. Every political group spawned its fringe element. Here before him were the most radical of that radical band.

  “What are you going to do?” he heard himself stammering. He cursed himself for the fear that shook in his voice.

  A calm reply can never overcome the wildness of a madman’s expression. “Drive them out. Get them off our planet. Send them back to where they belong.” The gun muzzle twitched. “We had too many bugs before they came here and we’ll have too many after they’ve packed up and left, but at least we won’t be expected to share our lives and homes and resources with them.”

  Adjami was not sure why he found himself backing up. It was not instinct. That would have dictated that he try to run, in which case they might ignore him. He was not their target, after all. As an experienced politician he could have tried arguing with them, if only to stall for time until local security became aware of the breach in its perimeter. Instead, he backed up, stumbled over and through the forest litter until he was standing in front of the thranx councilor. He could feel hard chitin bumping against his back, and his nostrils were filled with the sweet fragrance of blooming amaryllis.

  “I…I won’t permit this. If you people leave now, if you renew any complaints you may have through the proper channels, I will personally see to it that your views receive a hearing.”

  “We’re done with hearings,” snapped a short, frail woman who looked to be drowning in her bulky camouflage gear. To Adjami it appeared that the gun she was cradling was much too big for her. “Half the planetary government is composed of shortsighted idiots who don’t see what these filthy creatures are up to, and the other half has sold out in return for commerce we don’t need and promises of shared technology that haven’t materialized. What’s needed is for real humans to stand up and make a statement.” With one hand she stroked the inside of her rifle, and in response several telltales sprang to life within the barrel. “A loud statement.”

  “Get out of the way,” someone else said. Inside himself, Adjami shuddered. The voice that had spoken was neither hot nor cold, but something far worse. It was dead inside, the sound of a soul that had already committed ritual suicide and was prepared for death.

  Nevertheless, the politician in him would not quit. He had dealt with difficult people all his life. Even when coping with fanatics there was often room to compromise.

  “You’ve already made a strong statement simply by showing up here like this and successfully penetrating hive security.” He gestured with a shake of his head. “Go on then; go further. Set off some noisy explosions and make a lot of smoke. The media will lap it up and be all over you for your opinions. There might be some fines assessed for trespassing, but you’ll get your views splashed all over the tridee, and nobody will get hurt.” Silence greeted his proposal. “What do you say?”

  If the group had a leader, and such fringe organizations usually did, that personage chose not to manifest at that time. The middle-aged man who had spoken first provided a response.

  “I say that we’ll still have just as many bugs to deal with, and we won’t tolerate being fined for ‘trespassing’ on our own soil.” Using his rifle, he directed Adjami to move out of the line of fire. “You’re a putrid, contaminated bug lover, but you’re still human. Get out of the way.”

  One of the most overlooked components of true heroism is an abiding stubbornness in the face of danger. Lifting his arms out from his sides, Adjami held his ground. As with many accidental heroes, who are the most honest kind, if he had taken the time to consider what he was doing he probably would not have done it.

  “No. I won’t let you do this.” The shakiness had vanished from his voice.

  “You can’t stop us,” a voice in the armed crowd declared.

  “And you cannot do this,” he replied firmly.

  “Sure we can.” Raising her weapon, the frail woman with the too-large eyes fired.

  Adjami looked down at himself in disbelief. The old-fashioned but still effective projectile weapon had produced a small hole in his shirt. The stain that was spreading from it resembled the rapidly expanding penumbra of a sunspot. It did not hurt in the way the representative believed it might. There was no stabbing pain, no overwhelming throb. Instead, the wound burned as if he had been jabbed with a hot fireplace poker.

  Weakness overcame him, and he fell to his knees. Behind him a mellow, calm voice was murmuring in Terranglo. “Thank you for trying, my friend. Intelligence knows no shape. Neither does compassion. Tchik ua! re!iq.”

  The rest of what Hathvupredek the councilor said was lost in the ensuing staccato of gunfire. When it was over the two bodies, one mammalian, the other insectoid, lay on the ground. The intruders resumed their advance, stepping over and ignoring them both.

  There were no weapons in the hive. As guests of an indecisive planetary government representing a mistrustful species, it would have been impolite to stockpile anything that could have been construed as offensive. No one foresaw a need for guns or their presence on what was presumed to be hospitable ground.

  Breaking in through one of the lightly barred surface entrances that had been constructed subsequent to official recognition of the colony’s existence, the wrathful intruders met little resistance. Distributing grenades and bullets at every opportunity, they rampaged through the stunned hive firing indiscriminately at everyone and everything in their path, making no distinction between thranx “invaders” and human “traitors.”

  Peaceful though they were, thranx history was a litany of battle, of hive striving for supremacy over hive. More recently, they had been forced to deal with a frustrating, seemingly endless confrontation with the more militaristic AAnn. So the species was not unfamiliar with conflict, either on an individual or racial scale.

  As soon as the scope and ferocity of the incursion became known, internal barriers were closed to restrict the range and movement of the aggressors. Arming themselves with tools and kitchen implements, lines of silent, determined thranx converged on the invaders. There was no question of waiting for help from the human authorities, who in response to the distress call from the colony were already on their way to the Reserva. The hive was in danger, and the hive had to be defended.

  Many more thranx perished in repeated attempts to staunch the mindless slaughter. So too did several humans who were working or studying in the confines of the hive. The fanatics had come armed and ready to fight. But despite their determination and their murderous weaponry, they were not trained soldiers. The close confines of the hive, whose details were known to its inhabitants but foreign to the attackers, was likewise a detriment to their barbarous cause.

  By the time the Reserva rangers arrived, many of the invaders were already deceased or dying, surrounded by small mountains of thranx dead. When the first soldiers disembarked from a transport hastily ordered inland from the n
earest military base at Recife, it was nearly all over.

  Acclaimed as martyrs by their fellow fanatics and accorded grudging admiration in less demonstrative quarters by their “civilized” xenophobic supporters, the ravagers of the Amazon hive achieved the media exposure the brave, luckless Adjami had foreseen for them. Fortunately, the response of the majority of the population was embarrassment and apology. Reparations proposed by a guilty government were refused with the explanation that the thranx did not believe in materialistic expressions of sorrow. On the other hand, the many letters and expressions of regret from ordinary citizens were received thankfully and with elaborate gestures of gratitude.

  Not even such a catastrophe could obscure the effect the Pitar, who considerately offered condolences of their own to their fellow visitors to Earth, were having on human society. A pair (they never traveled alone) even visited the devastated hive to investigate the tragedy and offer commiseration on behalf of their government. Their compassionate presence was duly noted and monitored by the planetary media, who managed to give greater play to the mission of the Pitar than to the suffering of the hive’s inhabitants, many of whom had lost friends, coworkers, and even relatives in the debacle.

  While the media focused on the origins of the small but lethal fraternity of fanatics and strove to trace their sponsors, and the government representatives assigned to study the disaster tried to piece together evidence that might lead to proof of conspiracy and complicity beyond what was readily apparent, a meeting took place immediately after the confrontation that was to have much more far-reaching consequences for human-thranx relations than the aftermath of the savage raid itself. None present could have foreseen the results. Certainly none could have predicted the direction they would eventually take. In retrospect this was not surprising.

  Who could have suspected that greater things would arise from dealing with the future of the dead than the future of the living?

  4

  Father Pyreau picked up the gun without thinking. Here, in the depths of the alien hive, he was having difficulty breathing. He was mildly claustrophobic, and wide-open spaces and lofty cathedrals were his preferred venue. Deep beneath the surface of the Amazonian earth, lost in a warren of high-tech thranx tunnels, he had long ago loosened his collar.

  Lately there were many times, too many times, when he wanted to forget it altogether, to resign his position in the clergy and seek elsewhere the fulfillment that the church no longer gave him. He had been preparing for the regular Sunday service at the base when the emergency call had sounded. Swept up in the uncharacteristic alarm that followed, he had found himself on the transport rocketing inland before he knew what was going on. A superior officer had spotted him and, despite his initial protests, requisitioned his presence.

  “I have a feeling your services are liable to be in demand, Padre.” The major had not been very informative, but Pyreau could hardly disobey.

  Before he knew what was happening they had descended rapidly into seemingly unbroken rain forest, only to find themselves welcomed into a subterranean flight hangar by a milling mass of whistling, clicking, frantically chattering insects. No, not insects, he’d reminded himself. The exotic, visiting thranx were insectlike.

  He had never received a full explanation of the proceedings, not even when he’d found himself thrust forward and carried along with the rest of the hastily organized strike team. The soldiers surrounding him had seemed to know little more than he, but gradually the word trickled back that a small but fanatical band of xenophobes had infiltrated the colony and were killing every thranx in sight as well as any visiting humans who tried to interfere with their bloodthirsty spree. A visiting diplomat and several esteemed researchers had been among the earliest casualties.

  Swept into the depths, he had found himself caught in conditions that more closely resembled the traditional biblical hell than anything he had ever experienced before. A professional life that had previously been confined to conferring communion and counseling soldiers stationed at a peaceful tropical military base exploded in a succession of corridor-constricted concussions, flying body parts, the screams and shouts and whistles and clicks of the wounded and dying. Covered in blood both alien and human he had made his stunned, dazed way through the tunnels of death, bestowing what comfort he could on the injured and last rites on the deceased. This he had done in a spirit of faith and desperation regardless of the actual convictions of the departed. Atheists, agnostics, and true believers had received equal attention, there being no time to run dead soldiers’ personal identity chits through his chaplain’s scanner to ascertain the specifics of individual beliefs. Swirling, acrid smoke and the pungent stink of death had been his companions, and no angels had stepped out of the fiery gloom to assist his ministrations or ease his personal pain.

  He had not run out of bodies when he suddenly realized that he had run out of companions. He was alone except for the righteous dead. Alone, and lost.

  No, not quite lost. Another figure was stumbling down the fume-filled corridor toward him. It was human, male, its clothes torn and its exposed skin scarred. Dark blood smeared its face and arms, mixing with greasy camouflage paint. Against this grisly, dark smutch the whites of the man’s eyes stood out like sculpted marbles. He carried a large, battered rifle and wore camouflage gear but no uniform.

  He was not a soldier.

  Espying the figure of the padre kneeling beside an inert thranx and a dead corporal, the half-mad, half-dead xenophobe drew his own conclusion. “Dirty bug lover! You’re all gonna die! We’re gonna kill every one of you egg mother suckers!” The muzzle of the rifle started to come up.

  “I was only…!” Pyreau began. He did not finish the thought. It would do no good. Whatever reason the raving lunatic before him might once have possessed had been abandoned on the surface prior to his homicidal entry into the hive. It flared in his eyes and resounded in his voice.

  All chaplains receive basic military training as a matter of course. At Pyreau’s right hand lay a neuronic pistol. The green telltale pulsing in its handle showed that it still held a half charge. Whatever guided his fingers might have been divine intervention or simply the most basic, primitive need to survive. Picking up the pistol, he raised it as something loud and concussive echoed in his ears. A hot blade bit into the flesh of his left shoulder. Aiming more from reflex than training, he fired.

  The figure of the xenophobe shuddered even as the madman got off a second shot. It missed Pyreau entirely, slamming into the corridor wall behind him and to his left. Nerves paralyzed, his assailant went down in a heap, the rifle tumbling from his fingers. Silence roared. Once again, Father Pyreau was the only one alive in the tunnel.

  Mouth open in shock, he put the pistol down and thought to examine his shoulder. Blood leaked from what was no worse than a graze. Trying to rise, he found that his muscles had turned to rubber, his bones to putty. He could not stand.

  Then hands were levering him to his feet, and they were not human. The voice that accompanied the helping digits was firm but soft, almost whispery, the consonants oddly musical, the vowels separately enunciated only with difficulty. What he remembered most of all later was a piquancy redolent of damp honeysuckle.

  “Please try to use your legs. I cannot lift you by myself.”

  Admonished brain activated muscles, and Pyreau found himself erect amidst Armageddon. Stepping back, the thranx looked him up and down. “You wear the uniform of a soldier.”

  “I…I am a soldier, but a chaplain. Do you know what that is?”

  Antennae searched in opposing directions to parse as much of the acrid atmosphere as possible. “I’m afraid not. You are with the rescue team that arrived promptly but too late.”

  “Yes.” Pyreau nodded. “I’m sorry about that. We got here as fast as we could.”

  “I am certain that you did.” A truhand gestured at the quiescent carnage surrounding them: waves of dead flesh frozen in midcollapse. “There will be trouble
over this. Loud whistling and clicking and abundant recriminations to go around.” Golden compound eyes rose to meet the padre’s. “Enough for both species. What does a chaplain do?”

  Pyreau gestured helplessly at the massed bodies, the majority of which were thranx. “I represent one of humankind’s principal religions and, when necessary, all of them. I provide spiritual counsel to the men and women of the unit I happen to be assigned to, lead them in prayer on certain traditional days and also in private, minister to the sick at heart, and perform specific ceremonies that have religious overtones, such as the burying of the dead.”

  A truhand and foothand rose to gesture in the direction of the fanatic Pyreau had just shot. “You certainly ministered to him.”

  Pyreau did not look back—not because he was incapable of it, but because he did not want to. “I had no choice. It was him or me. Although I believe in a life after death, I’m in no hurry to trade this one for the other. It will come in its proper sequence, as it does to all of us.”

  “An interesting assertion of belief.” Reaching up and across with a foothand, the thranx tapped his own right shoulder with all four fingers. In the manner of thranx body decoration, a small, glistening black circle was inlaid in the hard blue-green chitin. Even in the dim light of the damaged corridor it shimmered with iridescence. “Do you know what this insignia signifies?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t.” The young priest badly wanted a drink of water. “I haven’t paid much attention to the details of contact between your kind and mine. There hasn’t been much new information available.”

  “I know.” The thranx made a gesture that the good father did not recognize for the expression of resignation that it was. “Your people are preoccupied with the Pitar. About them you want to know everything.” This observation was quietly stated and in no way accusing, but Pyreau felt oddly embarrassed just the same.