Tobias Buckell - Ragamuffin

John looked over at Mother Helene. Had he been lured here to be killed? She gave no sign of what was about to come.

“I was sent away to study where your kind came from,” the Loa continued, as if unaware of John’s nervousness. “We were a young race, so proud and sure of ourselves. I have shared memories from this time, and, oh, how we sing with determination.”

“Your DNA is left-handed?” John asked, trying to move the alien’s attention well past memories of its dead siblings. “How have you survived all this time?”

“We were wrong to think only one of us could hold the planet. We both could, if we drastically changed ourselves physically, just as we are doing now. In the beginning this was to be a base, a new beginning, and the start of an exodus for us. Unfortunately, in the end, all of our assumptions were wrong. We found we could share a planet, if we suffered deep changes to ourselves. We also found out that we could not run from our problems.”

“Why not?”

“We were supremely disappointed to find that the area beyond this planet was also infected. There was nowhere to really run to.”

“Infected?” By what? John knew of no infections.

The Loa shifted painfully, rocking the shell of its lower body. “When we strode into space, there were… things waiting for us. Creatures that grew up in the dark of interstellar space. We were not the top of the natural order, there were predators and ecologies out in the greater expanse of space. Within a generation of spreading out beyond our world, we were found by creatures that took control of our bodies and used our minds as a resource. In short time we were their limbs, minds, and eyes.

“We fought back. We stored our memories chemically in backups, reshaped ourselves, and tried to escape. That was why we came here and fought you so desperately. Only your kind was under the same yoke.”

“I’ve never heard of any such thing,” John said. “The Maatan and the Gahe occupied Earth, but they are their own races.”

“Behind them lie another force,” the Loa said. “But it does not matter now. We have come to believe that the truth is, intelligence puts us in competition directly with these, and other species. Our new metamorphosis will take us to the sea here in a new, safe form. Just as we adapted ourselves when we realized occupation of this world was pointless, that there were no clean stretches of space for us to live in. When we decided to try and help your kind against those of ours who dreamt in vain that holding this world, so far from ours, would be the right thing.”

“What will you become?”

“Giant deep-sea fish,” the Loa said. “Deep in the dark of the ocean.”

“And if we can’t keep this world from freezing, and the environment changes?” John asked.

“There are triggers programmed into us for such a thing. Listen, John, we have a gift for you.”

Mother Elene leaned forward and handed John a small wooden flask. John made to open it, but she shook her head. “What is it?” he asked.

“We are masters of the biological,” the Loa said. Its words were getting more strained, as if its mouth was hardening. “Now that we will be changed beyond recognition, we can leave you a dangerous gift. A plague. An infection that will destroy the Teotl. We have no need of this, we can move on. You are the ones stuck with this now, you are the young race. Do with it what you will, John, and we wish the city the best of luck.”

And that was it. The Loa’s eyes glazed over and it settled back into waiting to change into something different.

“Come.” Mother Elene led John back toward the elevator.

As it headed up, John looked over. “How will they reach the sea?”

“We go help them.”

“Even though it means they are leaving you,” John said.

Mother Elene did not respond. When the elevator jerked to a stop, she pointed him at the basement. “Be safe with that thing and don’t get kill. Is a powerful weapon.”

John tucked it into a pocket, gingerly. “Good day, Mother Elene, and good luck.”

She shut the door.

Outside, John blinked several times. Lines of Azteca soldiers marched down the street at the end of the block, making their way toward the walls of the city.

In the distance the sound of rifle fire popped and cracked, while several explosive booms echoed all across the city.

The occupation had begun. A large-bellied aircraft flew in over the walls and paused over the center of the city, then lowered itself into the large garden clearing by the Ministerial Mansion.

Fires burned, smoke columns reaching high into the sky.

“Hey, hey!” A woman peered through a crack in a nearby door and waved at John.

“What do you want?”

“Ain’t no one allowed out on the street. You go get shot. Get in here before any of them notice you.”

John ducked in, and they slammed the door shut behind him. Two women in long, gray dresses stood inside the small room, lit by a single candle. Chairs and tables lay scattered around; it had once been a restaurant. The smell of fried fish dripped out of the clammy inside air.

The woman who’d called John over wore a handkerchief over her mouth. “I’m Pam. This my sister, Violet. You know it dangerous out there. You John deBrun, right? I seen you once at the waterfront.”

John nodded. “Thanks. Yes.” So many in the city knew him it was useless to pretend otherwise.

“They looking for you, as well as any of the other councilmen who trying to hide.”

“Any idea why?” John walked over to the window. They all shrank back from it as a pair of men in bright red capes and rifles at the ready walked down the street.

“Here. They had rain these down on the city not too long ago.” Violet thrust a piece of paper in his hands.

It was a letter to anyone who had settled this planet several hundred years ago and still lived. The new Teotl needed their help and would pay well for it and guaranteed their safety.

John crumpled it and threw it on the concrete floor.

“You don’t believe them?” Pam asked.

“Never had any reason to trust the Teotl yet,” John said. “I’d rather not walk myself into my own death.”

“What you go do next?”

“I don’t know. What happened to the minister, was there any fighting back?”

“Not sure, but mongoose and ragamuffin fighting some. Mainly looking to get organize, it all happen so quick. Ship coming from the sky, Azteca pouring out,” Pam said.

“Most of the shooting you hear is people like we shooting from the window at them,” Violet said.

John patted his coat. Hide, or put himself in a position to strike back? Could he release a biological weapon against the Teotl? Would it be enough to turn the tide? “Can I get close to the Ministerial Mansion? That way I can watch who goes in, and maybe figure out what is happening in there?”

If they were really looking for people like him, they must need something. There were ways into the Mansion as well, and if he hooked up with mongoose-men, he could gain some help.

“We’ll help you,” Pam promised. “But for right now, we have to sit tight. Curfew is on for the next day, no one in the street. More feather-clot coming.”

“Door by door,” Violet said from the window. “They coming door by door to search we street.”

“They’re looking for us door by door?” John walked toward the window, but Pam grabbed his shirt.

“They looking for guns,” she said.

“And?”

“That go be a problem if they look a bit too close in here.” Pam pulled him toward the back of the room toward the kitchen. “Stacking plenty of rifle.”

They turned the corner and she opened a heavy iron lid of a massive coal stove with a grunt. Rows of rifles gleamed underneath.