Tobias Buckell - Ragamuffin

“So what next?” John carefully pocketed the necklace.

“What are these mongoose-men up to?” Pepper asked.

“Heading on with explosives to cause the Azteca some trouble. They were helping me get near the mansion. They have to move on.”

“Why?” Pepper frowned.

“Been watching to see if Jerome or you got captured.” John turned to the mongoose-men. “Thanks.”

They shook hands, glanced at Pepper one last time, then melted back off into the shadows.

“Can you remember how to get to the Crosswise bunker?” Pepper asked.

John nodded. “That memory is back, yes.”

“Go there. You’ll be safe. So will Jerome.”

“What you doing?” Jerome asked Pepper.

“I need to go ask some questions.” Pepper let go of the rail and walked off, brightly colored cape swaying until it was swallowed by the darkness.

“You been friend for a long, long time, right?” Jerome observed. “Know what he up to?”

“Whatever it is, someone’s going to be unhappy tonight. I think Pepper’s in a bit of a mood. Come on, we need to get to that sewer, it’s dangerous here.” Then John grabbed Jerome. “I’m glad to see you again, Son.”

Despite feeling that he’d grown out of it years ago, Jerome hugged him. “It was bad there. It was really bad.”

“I know.”

The water continued gurgling, and the moment passed. The city wasn’t theirs anymore, they had a lot more skulking around to do to get to this new bunker.

Xippilli watched the lights of Capitol City flicker from his office’s balcony on the Ministry building. The new, and quite hastily erected, wooden sacrificial pyramid flickered in the light of bonfires on the far edge of the gardens. It sat just past one of the strange flying machines.

He’d stood here, with dignitaries and leaders, coming to the office to seek their help. He’d done his best to try to get elected to the position, but had failed. Nanagadans weren’t ready to elect someone from over the mountains just yet.

Now it was his at last. An ashen victory.

Someone behind cleared his throat. Xippilli turned. A warrior-priest stood by the curtains, and Xippilli’s stomach flipped when the man walked forward. “There are thousands of people in our pens out there. Our gods blessed us. Shouldn’t we return the honor?”

Xippilli walked past the man, brushing aside the diaphanous curtains. He sat behind his desk and tapped the document Ahexotl had given him. “There could be ancient humans in those pens, the ‘old-fathers’ they call them here. The gods are outspoken about needing these people. Disobeying that is unwise.” He’d already met a Teotl by himself today. A strange-looking thing that was carried around, as it had tentacles.

It had been very upset.

It had reiterated how important it was that they capture, alive and well, any human beings who had lived three centuries ago when this planet had been settled. At that moment Xippilli had realized that he wasn’t really in charge of anything in the city.

The warrior-priest stared at Xippilli. “You are right. But do remember, before long, our men will want blood. Is the holy thing to do. It is the right thing.”

He left with a rustle, and Xippilli now sat alone in the office. That scared him more than anything else.

The burden of trying to save lives while maintaining his duties as the Azteca leader weighed heavily enough that he looked over at a heavily decorated pistol in a glass box on his desk.

But even suicide would be too horrible, as Xippilli knew that the lives of those in the pens would disappear along with his.

He sank into the chair and curled up in it.

The night air stank of fear.

Pepper sat on the corner of a railing at the top of a four-story apartment complex and watched the city. A massive wooden pyramid now dominated the end of the large gardens at the center of the city. Nanagadans milled around in large pens covered in razor wire.

But they weren’t being sacrificed.

He’d found himself a raincoat with big inner pockets to keep his gear in. The Azteca disguise made for better camouflage, but damn, he just wanted to be comfortable.

He sighed and walked over to a pipe and slid down to street level.

Two Hawk men standing by the corner of the street turned, slightly confused, and dropped to the cobblestones before even opening their mouths to shout a warning.

Pepper moved on.

In orbit the new Teotl were trying to stabilize and force open the wormhole that led back to humanity. He wanted that. Whatever he was going to do would encourage that. Pepper wanted to return home more than anything.

But after seeing the pens, he also wanted to make sure they paid a price for what they were doing here. If they helped destroy lives as they once had, Pepper would make them pay in kind.

But he had to wait, and it frustrated him. His plans had to be reset, on the fly, and that always led to mistakes.

Pepper sighed again, tired, and started zigzagging his way down the street, sniffing for something new, something a little sweeter, decayed, and familiar.

He found a Teotl half an hour later, ensconced deep in a basement room surrounded by warriors who had to be silently killed, one by one.

Pepper pulled out a knife in each hand and took several deep breaths, then kicked the solid-oak door in.

A handful of Azteca bodyguards turned around, grabbing weapons.

None of the mercifully brief struggles and choked silences drew much attention.

John turned to the thick stone door as it creaked open. No one but Pepper would know how to get here. Still, he reached into a small canvas bag one of the mongoose-men had given him and pulled a pistol out.

Jerome had fallen asleep against one of the walls. The few hours they’d had alone waiting for Pepper had been enough to catch him up on what had happened in Tenochtitlanome, as well as to snack on some fruit and dried meat John had found in the bag.

“Give me a hand.” Pepper dragged a large wicker basket in with him. Three pale tentacles with gold tips dangled out of its side.

Jerome woke up, blinking, and jumped up to help pull it in. He shut the well-weighted door with a slow thud.

Pepper sat down, out of breath. “I almost got caught by the tide coming through.” The Crosswise bunker lay deep under the city, hundreds of feet below Crosswise Street. Getting there took one through flooded storm drains and city tide-management sewers. It made it safe to hole up in.

A tentacle stirred. Pepper raised a hand. “Give me the collar.”

“Here.” John handed it over and Pepper snapped the ring of material on the creature in the basket.

Pepper leaned back, as if admiring his handiwork. “It was meant for whoever they talking into being an emissary. Now we put it on one of them .”

The creature stirred and coughed up phlegm. Pepper grabbed the rim of the basket and flipped it to dump the Teotl out onto the ground. It tumbled and flailed until Pepper stopped it with a swift kick.

It looked like something that belonged underwater, John thought. More octopus than biped. Its skin shone in the low light of the ceiling’s bioluminescent rock glow. Capitol City had been designed using some incredible tricks, most of them taught to the Nanagadans by aliens like this three hundred years ago.

Lidded eyes blinked, and it spat a series of syllables at them in a whistle.

“You can do better,” Pepper said in a soft voice. “I know you understand, I know you speak Anglic.”

It stared at them. Then from within the beaklike mouth it said, “You are insane.”