Christopher Nuttall - Invasion

And the warriors!

She’d expected — as had they — that they would simply be killed. Instead, they had been brought into the human clan, as she was coming to think of it. It was an odd clan, but one she was starting to associate herself with, and so was Fallon. The female researcher into humanity was rapidly becoming one of her own test subjects, something that was even moderating her attitude to Femala. She’d scorned the sterile female on the shuttle, but now they were almost friends, although there would always be that barrier between them. Fallon had the attention of all of the warriors, and probably always would, unless more females arrived and joined the clan… and she studied humans. She believed that the humans meant what they said when they’d offered to treat them well, and, in many ways, she had almost gone completely over to them. She couldn’t fight her own biology, while Femala, who had been brought up in a society where she was worthless, was on the verge of joining her. She almost welcomed the sight of new and different humans…

They were, she had decided, an odd race. What she had thought to be a disgusting skin disease was actually a change in skin colour that, she had been assured, covered the entire body. Their males actually did real work! She had seen a male-female pair and had addressed the female as the engineer, only to discover that it was the male who was the engineer and the female was a security guard. That had turned her world upside down; males didn’t have long-term professions. They were Priests or Warriors, not engineers or doctors. They didn’t have the mindsets to do more than rote work… or was she wrong? The human hadn’t known as much as she had about practical work in space, but he had known more of the theoretical side of space construction work… and even spacecraft design. The conversations had been productive and Femala felt the last of her doubts slipping away. She was one of them now.

It was easy to know what the humans were doing. They wanted — needed, desperately — to get back into space. They had the services of a tech expert, one of the foremost in the system, and they would be foolish not to use her. It gave her value and even a few bargaining chips; she’d traded her assistance for more human books and even entertainment. The humans seemed to be more imaginative than her own people, even though she’d watched several episodes of human science-fiction and couldn’t stop herself laughing, and yet… was it really something unique about them, or could her own people match it, under the right conditions? Her position had been permanently uncertain under the Theocracy… and yet, was that a natural law, or something invented? Had God really decreed that all sterile females were to die?

The thought blazed through her head. The High Priest had kept her alive … and, in doing so, had broken that law… if that law existed! He wouldn’t have got away with it, High Priest or no, not when there were hundreds of other Priests who wanted to be High Priest themselves. One of them would have used it against him, or the Inquisitors would have taken action; they couldn’t allow such open breaking of the rules, not by a High Priest. Femala’s existence and nature was hardly a secret either; it wasn’t something that could be covered up, so why had he been allowed to keep her? The only reason that made sense was that there was no such law!

And yet… it happened. Free, now, from restrictions, she wondered at her own society. The humans had so much and her own people so little, when it should have been the other way around. She knew how to extract wealth from asteroids, gas giants and comets; the Takaina should have been able to give each of their people a life-style they could only dream about, and yet… they didn’t. All resources were bent towards the task of expanding and spreading the faith across the universe. In time, Guiding Star or a replacement built on Earth would continue onwards, leaving a massive settlement behind. Earth would become part of the Theocracy… but for how long? What effect would it have on her society if this, the knowledge of how another race acted, became common knowledge?

They kept us down , she thought, and felt her delight at making the connection turn to rage. She hadn’t seen it because she had had nothing to compare it to. She hadn’t been part of society because society had shunned her… and even the one who had saved her hadn’t been able to give her what she needed. She’d been held down by her own society… and, she saw now, the same was true of all of them. The males went to become warriors, where they died, or priests, where they became part of the system, while the females were held down by the self-perpetrating clans. How could they escape when they were trapped in chains that held their minds?

Humans had escaped, in part of their history, and others had remained trapped. It was possible to escape, but how could she spread the word to the rest of her people? How could she get them to believe and change when there was no way that they would listen to a sterile female who was a prisoner? Everyone knew that someone who had been a prisoner could no longer be completely trusted… and she was honest enough with herself to admit that her mind might not be what it had been. The High Priest wouldn’t be able to spare her this time, even if he wanted to spare her; she would be burned alive by the Inquisitors.

And why had he spared her anyway? The humans had attributed it to unsavoury motives, but while the Takaina males had sex for enjoyment as well as procreation, they wouldn’t have it with a sterile female, one who was unable to join them fully in the act. Or was that, too, a part of their conditioning? The humans seemed to believe all kinds of silly things about sex and there was no reason, on the face of it, while the Takaina could not be the same. What possible use had he had for her?

She was still mulling over that question when the human, Paul James, was shown into her quarters. She’d grown to like him, along with the other humans, even though she wasn’t sure of his duties. A person who had been in charge of preparing for an alien invasion should be able to do more than the Takaina had faced, but if the humans had had the idea that an alien invasion should consist of massive flying saucers with impossible beam weapons and even more impossible force shields, they probably hadn’t been able to come up with a proper defence. Amazing special effects, though; the Takaina had never come up with anything like them.

“Hi,” she said, suddenly aware of her manners. He was, technically speaking, senior in the clan to her, although that had required some mental adjustment as well. No male was normally of any position within the clan. That was a female role. “How have you been?”

She was starting to recognise some human emotions, but the look on his face was beyond her. “Washington has been destroyed,” he said, grimly. The liquid that had appeared in one eye couldn’t be healthy. “Your people took out an entire city.”

“Mass slaughter is forbidden by the Truth,” Femala protested, honestly shocked. The High Priest had to have gone mad. The only justification for such slaughter was to prevent the spread of heresy. Earth, being largely unaware of the Truth, didn’t count as a legitimate target. “What happened?”

He explained, bit by bit. “The High Priest had to be more than a little worried about your sudden willingness to use nukes,” Femala said, when he had finished. “How many of your people were killed?”

“No one is sure, yet,” Paul admitted. “The preliminary figures are high, but they’re always high; all we know for sure is that there were several million people under the footprint of the nuke when it went off. Why did they hit Washington, of all places?”