David Gerrold: A Season for Slaughter

I doubted very much that I would ever equal Daniel Goodman's audience share. For one thing, I wasn't tempted to try, and for another, there weren't that many people left alive on the Earththat is, if the latest government projections were to be believed. And besides, watching someone being eaten alive by shambler tenants—even as live interactive drama-is apparently nowhere near as interesting to the average viewer as finding out whose convexities have been inserted into whose concavities.

I took another's… I… o… w step, tugging Major Bellus after me. He was alternating between fury and panic. I wondered how long until he slipped over the edge and bolted like a frightened rabbit. This was going to be very interesting.

I itched all over. I wanted nothing more than a long deep soul-satisfying scratch all over my body. I wanted someone-preferably a professional, but an enthusiastic amateur would not be turned away—to start at the little bald spot at the center of my itchy scalp and then work her way slowly down my body, working with gentle fingertips across the painfully tight muscles of my shoulders, and then vigorotWy massaging all the way down my back, kneading my spine until it cracked, then proceeding down through the cramped muscles of my legs, rolling them like bread dough, and stoping only when he or she or it (who cares?) reached the soles of my aching feet. Ahhh!

It was a terrific dream, but it didn't make the pain go away. My throat was dry and my arms hurt like hell. And my back. And both my shoulders. This was going to have to end soon, one way or another…

As a result of the current military policy of burning out the most virulent pockets of infection as rapidly as possible, the most highly developed phases of the infestation have been observed only in a few isolated areas, and only for very short periods of time. No long-period observations have been possible.

Whatever the military value of this strategy, it has left the scientific community with an impoverished view and an inability to accurately predict the directions of the ecological expansion confronting us. Despite the increased use of robots and remote-controlled probes, and despite the expansion of our biosphere facilities on both coasts, without on-site long-period observations, our models of how the infestation spreads and develops remain so woefully limited that any summary of what we know must be understood to represent only the barest of outlines. We cannot predict with any certainty what the ultimate form of the infestation may be, how it will develop, and what roles its member species will eventually play in that ecology.

Obtaining a better understanding of the final phase of the infestation and the stable patterns that exist in an established Chtorran ecology is not simply a matter of scientific curiosity; it may eventually provide the best tactical intelligence for our military strategy as well. We may discover that we can direct our energies more efficiently against some smaller, seemingly more innocuous part of the emerging structure, and have much more significant long-term impact than we presently experience with our current tactic of slashing and burning every embryonic mandala immediately upon detection.

—The Red Book,

(Release 22.19A)

The major mumbled something. "What?"

He repeated it. "You think you're so fucking smart, don't you?"

"You don't have to believe me. The tanks are over there. Go ahead. Make a run for it." Slowly, elaborately, I took another step. "Well, go ahead," I encouraged.

He didn't move. "You want me to do it, don't you?"

I shrugged. "After the tenants have fed, they'll be torpid. My chances'll be a lot better."

"Fuck you," he said.

"You have neither the looks nor the money," I replied. I took another step.

He glared at me, fuming. He looked at the tanks, then glanced uneasily back at the trees. He looked trapped. Very reluctantly-he had no choice-he lifted one heavy-booted foot high, stretched elaborately, and stuck it forward. Slowly, he brought his leg back down again, as gently as he could. He shifted his weight carefully forward. His caution was exaggerated almost to the point of hysteria. "They're just trees," he said. "Fucking trees."

"And they can cover at least five, maybe six kilometers a week in search of water and suitable soil. And the tenants will range two or three klicks from the home tree, looking for prey. Shamblers host at least thirty symbiotic relationships that we've already identified; probably a lot more. Some people think they're the habitat for at least six different ecologies-in their roots, in their trunks, in their branches, in their leaves, in the canopy, and in the wake of debris they leave behind; you don't know what you're dealing with here. There's nothing on Earth that even comes close. Have you ever heard of army spiders?"

He didn't answer.

"They can grow as big as your foot. Imagine a swarm of giant red tarantulas, only leaner, meaner, and hungrier. They're eight-legged vampires. They weave huge webs of very sticky silk. The slightest nudge on it will bring the whole nest of them down on you. The poison will paralyze you, but it won't kill you." I took a long, slow step. "You'll be conscious the whole time they're feeding."

"Army spiders live in the shamblers?"

"Sometimes. We think it's a temporary marriage of convenience. We think the spiders are waiting for their preferred habitat to develop." I added, "But the spiders aren't the worst. It's just that nothing else will live in the same tree with them. That's why we think they're opportunists. Normally, a shambler carries a mixed bag of problems: vampires and wraiths and all kinds of other little biters.

"Sometimes they work in teams," I continued cheerfully. "The vampires follow the wraiths. They wait until the wraith has toppled something, then they come in and start feeding too. We used to see them going after calves. This year we're getting more and more reports of full-size cattle being taken. It's not a pretty sight. We're experimenting with cattle-armor and nano-fleas, but-" I shrugged. "It's still nasty. We're still losing the livestock. Have you ever heard a horse screaming? Or a cow?" The major made an untranslatable sound.

I sniffed the air. "What?" he asked.

"Well, I tried to tell you before. That smell. It means gorps."

"Yeah? I thought you said they weren't dangerous."

"Well, yes and no. They're like lawyers. They're not dangerous unless you excite them."

"How dangerous… are the gorps?"

"It depends on how hungry they are. Mostly they travel with shamblers. They like to feed on the leavings of the tenants. Where you find one, you're likely to find the other. But a gorp isn't fussy. Sometimes it doesn't notice that something isn't dead before it starts eating. They don't think very fast; it's not a good idea to let one get its hands on you. I hate to say it, but this looks like a pretty hungry neighborhood. Smell the air. That's a whole fumble of gorps. I'm surprised we haven't seen them already. They've got to have heard the tanks. When they hunt, they hunt in packs, and they feel the creeper nerves for sympathetic vibrations. You want to know more?"

He was dangerously pale again. He shook his head.

I continued anyway. "I think the tenants we really have to worry about are the toe-hoppers and the carrion bees."

Despite himself, he asked, "Toe-hoppers?"

"Goblins. They're tiny little things. They look a little like monkeys, but they're small enough to sit in your hand; only they're not real cute. They're just weird. Big feet, big ears, oversized claws and heads. Very tiny bodies. Short stubby limbs. But they have faces like-I don't know-bulldogs, I guess; they're so ugly and grotesque, they look like little gargoyles. Individually, they're harmless. Well, mostly harmless; they're even easy to kill. They feed on bugs and mice, berries, nuts, leaves-whatever. They're warm-blooded, but they lay these leathery little eggs, hundreds at a time; one set of parents can have thousands of offspring in a single season. Fortunately, they don't nest and they don't protect their eggs, so most of the children are eaten before they hatch. Normally, that is.