#doomhold

Really, they couldn’t blame their offspring. The humans behaved as though they wanted to be snatched and devoured. Ever since the family had made land, the gormless mammals had been following them around, taking pictures and pushing each other aside to get a better view. Baring teeth and growling hadn’t made them flee, only retreat a few paces.

And there were more and more of them now that Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded and their chicks had left the beach and followed the stench of a carcass into the stone jungle. Dozens. Maybe hundreds.

Memories arose of a hunt-brother lost, crushed, when a lumbering herd of herbivores had, without warning, started to stampede.

Perhaps leaving the fortress was a mistake.

“Do not tarry,” they said. “We’re almost there. As soon as we’ve eaten, we will return home.”

They moved onward. The crowd moved with them. The rich, alluring smell grew stronger, and it became apparent that it was emanating from…

 ‘Grill’. That’s called a ‘grill’. The structure it’s attached to is a ‘roadside food stall’. The strange marks on the sign mean ‘dhanya rolls’, ‘penny polonie’, ‘halaal’, and ‘on special today’. The old human standing next to it is ‘selling’ the items listed on the sign, which means that he wants to exchange them for ‘currency’, which is -...

Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded grimaced and pushed back the tide of information threatening to flood their brain. They would not end up like Snow and the others, talkative and contradictory and full of doubts and questions. Knowledge that wasn’t directly relevant to their family’s survival was to be discarded. This, before them, was food. That was all that mattered.

Before they could take the food, the chicks all chirped in excitement as Sky swooped down and landed on the ground before them.

“We have been worried sick,” she said.

“There was no need,” they replied, finding her perpetual haughtiness grating. “We’ve come to no harm. We were just exploring our new territory.”

“This is not your territory, you blasted fool! Good grief. Do you have any idea how badly this venture could have gone? How much danger you’ve put yourself in? Why didn’t you at least tell us where you were going? I’ve been flying all over town searching for you! Twitch is hysterical!”

Am I – I, faster than all my siblings, I, who have raised twenty-nine chicks to adulthood, I, who have dipped my snout into a felled brachiosaur’s opened chest and felt its blood stop pumping – being scolded? In front of my own children?

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” Sky demanded.

“No,” said Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded. “Go away.”

Purposefully, they stepped around her and approached the meat merchant. A short growl was enough to make him back away, leaving his wares undefended.

Sky flew up to perch on the sign and announced, “I am here on sufferance, comrade. I had planned to spend today using Wimberley’s money to purchase a ship with which to house my future marine animal rescue society. Babysitting you was not on my schedule. And if the personal inconvenience weren’t enough, I find you stealing.”

“A human word.”

“We are guests in their home and should be respectful of their laws,” said Sky, watching disapprovingly as the children filled their bellies.

“Should we? Are their laws respectful of us? If a human stole food from you, would it be punished? Besides, we’ve already broken their laws by parking Doomhold in their bay. We’re planning to break more laws in pursuit of a better world. Or will you let a human judge decide whether or not you should be allowed to save imperilled dolphins?”

“Hmph. And what greater good is served by you frightening an innocent old man and pilfering his only source of income?”

Penny polonie was delicious. They swallowed two more before replying, “Would you prefer me and mine make do with the innocent old man himself?”

“I would prefer you to set a better example for your children!”

“I am teaching my children how to survive. That is my one and only duty.”

“You have a duty to the team! We’ve all been panicking since we realised you were missing. How did you even get to shore?”

“I swam, the chicks on my back. Then we chanced upon a boat and I persuaded its owner to take us the rest of the way.”

“By which you mean you intimidated some other poor human into obeying you with threats of violence. Eggs, that is not how we do things.”

“It’s how everyone does everything. And I’ve asked you not to call me that. Go away now, bird.”

How irritating. Now their return to the safety of Doomhold would have to be delayed for at least a few days, lest Sky think her insolent chiding had worked.

“Come,” they ordered the chicks, who were finishing off the sausages.

The mountain – they’d seek refuge there. Its lower slopes were gentle and grassy, and boasted fewer human dwellings. They’d be safe to digest their meal in peace.

“You’re mad if you think I’m leaving you out here unsupervised!” Sky squawked.

They ignored her.

***

“Aaaargh – hnngh – uueergh – God – gross. Gross!” Trench opined, covering her mouth with her hand.  

Click-9 rolled past her. Swaggered past her. They’d given themselves a makeover that morning, adding new graffiti to the ten inches of available space below their solar panels; a row of pink ponies wearing leg warmers, prancing across a field of glass shards, and the words ‘THIS MACHINE SPILLS FAECES’ (which was clever and witty – fuck you, Ziklag) in a font that turned every ‘I’ into a dick.

They felt so pretty. Hopefully it would be enough to dampen the vicious dysphoria that was going to hit them in the next few minutes.

“Yeah. Mommy hasn’t gussied him up like she did her precious Val,” they acknowledged. “But to be honest, I don’t think he’d have wanted her to. He’s never cared about looking hot and the whole ‘Arnie at the end of Terminator 2’ thing is kinda badass. And your brother will probably be into it.”

Scoffing, she retorted, “That’s not saying much. Ziklag is into some stuff.”

As she spoke, she ran her thumb over her phone’s dark screen.

She’d been using it like a stim toy lately, fiddling with it without turning it on. Having gotten the worst of withdrawal out of the way back in Dinosaur Land, she’d decided to try deliberately abstaining for a while, just to see if it helped. Click-9 thought it would make more sense to lock her phone in a cupboard or throw it into the sea, but she’d insisted that having the option to turn it on was crucial to the task of training herself not to do so.

Trench stood guard at the door while Click-9 plugged one of their cords into a port on the left side of Wimberley’s head.

They could feel his consciousness, half-aware and bewildered, and spoke to it in gentle tones. “Hey, Big W. It’s me. Click-9. I’m here with Trench. Ziklag’s not here – we figured he might not like what we’re about to do – might not trust us to get it right – but he’s okay. Know you’ve been through a lot, but are y’all up for a quick chinwag? A heart-to-heart? A brainstorming session?”

Haltingly, tentatively, Wimberley projected a wordless willingness to listen. Language was beyond him.

“Okay, cool. Here’s the sitch: You’re mostly fixed. You’ve been mostly fixed for a while now. Doomhold keeps tinkering with you, trying to make your bones stronger or your organs more efficient, but all the hard stuff’s done. And… and I think she’s stalling. I think she’s worried about you being back on the board now that you’re a nifty cyborg with, presumably, some of Valentina’s nifty cyborg powers. So she’s holding off on finishing you up. Capisce?”

A dim pulse of anger. He understood.

Click-9’s antennae wiggled with excitement. “So I’m gonna do it! I’m gonna get you back on your feet, right now!”

“What’s he saying?” asked Trench.

“He’s thrilled,” Click-9 replied, which wasn’t entirely truthful.

Shuffling forward, her arms wrapped tight around her waist, Trench said, “I know why I’m doing this. Why’re you doing this?”

“Fun. A chance to cause problems.”

“We’re friends, yeah? Friends don’t lie.”

“Ugh. Sappy,” said Click-9, before their body began a passable impression of a Rubik’s cube attempting mitosis while trying to build a Lego centipede – which is to say that it was bizarre, and not at all the sort of thing you wanted to see happen to an acquaintance. Trench was on the verge of calling for help when she grasped what was actually happening.

“Wow. Real dickish of you not to ever mention you could do that, Click.”

Click-9’s parts finally stopped shifting around. They looked down at their new shape with immense dislike. “I don’t do it. Hardly ever. Hate doing it. Wouldn’t be doing it now if I didn’t need fingers to finish putting Humpty Dumpty over here back together. You know what he said the first time he showed me how to do it? He said it was for my self-esteem. So that I could feel ‘normal’. Jackass.”

They made a gesture with their hand. Their metal took on the semblance of skin, while a messy clump of purple hair sprouted from their scalp. One more gesture, and they’d donned a holographic pair of jeans and a white T-shirt.

“The early versions of me were pathetic. ‘Bout as sturdy as a Swarovski bowling ball. And I’ve never been good at staying out of trouble. He’s had to rebuild me seventeen times,” said Click-9, turning to Wimberley. “You know what it’s like, owing that kind of debt to a mean old fuck-up like him? It sucks a big one! So I’m evening the score.”

***

No matter how many bloody battles survived, no matter how many monstrous enemies faced, no matter how noble one’s cause or murderous one’s grudges, no matter what horrors you have seen or what atrocities you have committed, no one – no single living soul – is ever really prepared for that bleak, inevitable morning when a mild-mannered man with a clipboard shows up and starts politely asking questions.

“What, specifically, are you planning to do, Ms Snow?”

He was a short distance beyond middle-aged, walked with a cane, sported an imperfectly-sculpted beard, and had introduced himself as Mr Naqvi.

Luckily, Valentina had warned Snow that someone like him would soon materialise. She’d had a little time to steel herself, and to plan.

She took him straight to the command centre.

“Here’s a map of your city,” she said, trying to sound relaxed and confident.

A detailed hologram appeared in the air overhead.

“And this is a map of the bay.”

The hologram flickered; changed.

“The areas we intend to work on are in red. As you can see, we’ll be starting out far away from the ports and the beaches – minimising disruption to your daily lives as much as we can.”

“Very considerate of you,” said Major Zandeki, who was escorting Mr Naqvi. She’d brought gifts; a variety of boxed meals prepared by the city’s best chefs, several hundred ‘Welcome To Earth!’ greeting cards from schoolchildren, and a letter from the president. She’d also brought treats for Parabola, who was rubbing against her ankles and purring.

The hologram flickered again and became a row of graphs.

“These,” said Snow, hitting her stride, “indicate levels of water pollution in different quadrants. Fish nets. Microplastics. Sewage. And these graphs over here indicate those levels after we’ve completed Phase One of our Ocean Restoration and Clean-up Activities, or ORCA.”

(It had been very, very important to Waddles that the name be a cool acronym. She’d had to work hard to persuade him that they shouldn’t call it the ‘Actionable Water and Environment Scheme of Mondo Excellence’.)

The graphs disappeared, replaced by a series of simple animations. “ORCA Phase One will involve deploying underwater drones, thousands of them, to clear litter – specifically, objects more than three centimetres in diameter – from the water. The litter will be transported back here and converted into more drones.”

Mr Naqvi wrote something down on his clipboard and said, “What will the drones do upon encountering entangled animals? Seals with string and plastic bags around their necks, and so forth?”

“Alert us.”

“And you will…?”

“Go help ‘em out, obviously,” said Twitch.

A slight wince. “Mm. Do any of you have formal training in caring for injured wild animals?”

Twitch squeaked in amusement. “Buddy! Look at us! We are wild animals!”

Further dour clipboarding ensued. “Thought you were aliens. Mmm. No qualifications from accredited institutions, then? No experience in the field? No internships, even? Hmm. No, see, that’s a problem. We don’t let just anyone handle our marine wildlife. And what will you do afterwards? When the litter’s gone – if you do manage to clear up the litter – frankly, I have doubts – not sure how well those drones of yours will stand up to our storms and choppy waters – nevertheless, let’s say you clear the litter. How do you stop it coming back? More than five million people living here now. You gonna follow every one of ‘em around with a bag? Why’re you starting with the bay, anyway? Got bigger problems on land.”

“Goodness!” said Major Zandeki, with a forced laugh. “Mr Naqvi, I – we – we talked about this, yes? Let’s not interrogate our new friends. They’re being extremely generous, after all.”

“We… didn’t talk about it, actually,” said Mr Naqvi, adjusting his spectacles. “The Deputy President dragged me into this because the Minister of Defence and the Minister of Home Affairs are having a furious row over which of their minions should be allowed to visit the spaceship first. Respectfully, ma’am, you didn’t once ask my opinion on anything. You gave me a list of questions I was and wasn’t allowed to ask, and another list of things I will and won’t be allowed to say at the press conference, and you told me to keep my reservations to myself. But Ms Snow seems to me like a fair-minded and reasonable young wom... bear, who will understand that I only want to help her and her allies with their important mission.”

Mr Naqvi was sick. Bad sick. Snow could smell it on him.

She could also smell two dogs whose heads he’d rubbed before leaving his home, three children who’d hugged his legs, and over twenty adults who’d patted his back and shaken his hand in the last day or so. Major Zandeki was respected and admired by her fellow humans. Mr Naqvi was cherished. Cherished, and near death. His family and friends couldn’t have wanted him to come here today, to venture into the frightful and uncanny structure looming over their city and argue with talking beasts. He’d come anyway. He’d thought this meeting was important.

“I do understand,” Snow said, bowing her head. “And I’d like your advice, sir. Very much.”

He tucked his clipboard under his arm and clasped his hands at his waist. “We’ve been working on all this. You are aware of that? This is our home, and we’ve been hard at work for years. We already have the data, the plans. You’ll get farther if you help us and build on our accomplishments instead of doing everything by yourselves. Now – may I have a chair, please? I’d like to hear what else you have to say, but my knees aren’t what they were.”

They fetched him a chair, and Snow continued with her presentation.

***

Waddles had appointed himself Ziklag’s overseer, and was discharging his duties with courage, courtesy, conscientiousness, and the quiet seething hatred a person reserves for someone who, they secretly suspect, has the kind of life they would like to have themselves.

“Where the devil is my bucket?”

What a lame thing to say. If I was a supervillain – not that I ever would be – of course not – but if I was, I’d never say anything so uncool. Actually, I wouldn’t say anything at all! I’d be the strong, silent type. My orders would be conveyed to my henchmen via brief gestures. My only response to my enemies’ taunts would be swift and deadly retaliation. An aura of mystery would surround my every –

“And what did you do to my mop?” Ziklag whined, holding up what remained of it.

“The chicks like chewing on stuff. You should see what they did to Val’s spare boots. What d’you need a mop for, anyway? You said you were gonna do, like, repairs and upgrades and stuff.”

“I am not even going to contemplate repairs until I have a workspace that won’t give me ten different diseases! This whole deck is filthy! What happened to the sanitation drones?”

“Deactivated ‘em. One rolled over Twitch’s tail and another destroyed my best fish bone sculpture. And they kept wiping our smells off of everything! I know human noses are basically useless, but that’s a big deal for us!”

Ziklag threw the mop aside, took a small bottle of hand sanitiser from his dungarees, and applied it liberally, grumbling all the while.

Dungarees. Man, it’s so disappointing. If I was a supervillain, I’d wear black leather all the time, and I’d have cool sinister black shoes and a cool sinister car. I’d wear red sunglasses, even indoors.

Waddles thought back to Snow’s most recent lesson – ‘Authoritarianism and Tyranny in the 20th Century’ – a real downer, that one – and admitted to himself that none of the seriously hardcore evil people featured in it had worn badass red sunglasses. In fact, most of them had a notable lack of style and flare.

Which… makes sense, maybe. To dress real slick, you gotta use your brain. You gotta think about how other people think. About how they feel when they look at you, and what they like and don’t like. At a minimum, you gotta grasp that other people exist and have feelings. Which, right from the get-go, is gonna filter out a lot of evil types.

“Gloves,” said Ziklag, decisively. “If I am to work in these conditions, I insist on gloves.”

“Are you evil?” Waddles asked.

“What?”

“I mean… you’re evil. But do you know that you’re evil? And – like – isn’t it embarrassing? To be evil? Why do you do it?”

Ziklag squinted at him. “You’re a cretin.”

“Nah, c’mon. I’m genuinely curious! What’s so nifty about making everyone sad and angry?”

“I’m not. I’m making you and your friends sad and angry. It’s nifty because you’re in our way and undermining everything we’ve worked for. Also – this cannot be overstated – I simply do not like you.”

“I know! I don’t like you either!” Waddles squawked. “But I’m still curious about you! Aren’t you curious about me? You should be! When two people believe different things and do different things… isn’t that interesting? Isn’t that worth talking about? Look, here’s an idea. You give me one good reason for being a villain and I’ll give you one good reason for being a hero. I’ll go first: I’m a hero because making the world better feels nice. Now you.”

Scowling, Ziklag snapped, “That is perhaps the stupidest thing I’ve heard of late that didn’t come out of Dr Phlegmatic’s speakers. Making the world better is hard, slow, thankless, unpaid, unrewarding, miserable work. If you’re enjoying it, you’re not doing it right.”

Which was such a baldly illogical statement that Waddles had no response. It was as though Ziklag had told him that feet didn’t exist.

There was no time to get to the bottom of it, though, because someone had just lifted Waddles off the ground, swung him round in the air, and squeeeeeezed him to their chest, crying, “I missed hugging you so much!”

“Auntie?” he cried. “Auntie! You’re back! How? What happened?”

“What indeed? Where, might I ask, is Doomhold?” said Ziklag.

Valentina’s warm smile frosted over and Waddles was suddenly acutely aware that he was being clutched by a stranger. “Still here, Ziklag. Valentina and I have reached an agreement.”

Then she thawed and kissed Waddles on the head. “Yes. We’re trying something new. And it’s such a relief to feel like myself – I can’t tell you what a relief it is. I’ve been running laps around the deck for the last hour. I can move again, Waddles!”

“But are you really okay having that meanie stuck in the same head as you? Isn’t it gonna get super annoying?” asked Waddles, worriedly.

“Never mind that! If you’re both here, who’s controlling the fortress?” Ziklag demanded. “Who’s keeping an eye on Click-9 and Trench? Who’s monitoring Wimberley?”

Even now that she’d relaxed her grip, it was easy to tell when Doomhold was in the driver’s seat. Waddles didn’t even need to see her expression. Her voice was enough: “Ziklag, I have dedicated all my time and energy to Wimberley’s survival for the last three months. I have taken excellent care of him. Have no doubt that he would have died if not for me. As it stands, his recovery is nearly complete. Another week – another month, say. But if you dare chastise me every time I take a break and tend to other matters, you’ll be lucky if he wakes up before your eightieth birthday!”

***

Wimberley was in the corridor again.

Sometimes it was the car, sometimes it was the corridor. The corridor was worse. The car had blood, pathos, tragedy. The corridor was tawdry.

The corridor was where he’d put it all together.

The murmured conversations behind closed doors.

Their sudden loss of interest in his ongoing struggle to go outside, when at first they’d browbeaten him about overcoming his fears and frailty.

His mother’s no longer enjoying her regular evening glass of wine.

The improvement in both their moods.

And now, the final puzzle piece; sitting in the corridor, eavesdropping on a telephone conversation in which his father mentioned how surprisingly quick and easy the vasectomy reversal had been.

“I’ll run away!” Wimberley had bellowed at them both, aware that the threat was made even more impotent by his voice not having yet fully broken. “I’ll – I’ll kill it! I’ll throw it out a window!”

Which, if nothing else, had effectively severed the last threads of honest affection, especially after she’d lost the thing and he’d spent the whole week afterwards rolling merrily around the house blowing on a party streamer. (That particular memory was a comfort in the years to come: I wasn’t a teary-eyed victim. I was an active participant. I made her stop loving me. Not bad for a twelve-year-old, eh?)

He sometimes dreamed of his failed replacement. They’d be the spitting image of his great-grandfather, who’d made the family fortune. Slick. Sleek. Charismatic and handsome. A sportsman, no doubt, and a lady’s man, the sort who starred in novels with titles like ‘The Billionaire Alpha Bad Boy’s Secret Steamy Sex Games’.

But more often, he dreamed of the corridor.

“Aaaargh – okay, no,” said Click-9, who was there for some reason. “This is activating all my angst allergies. Your crummy childhood’s giving me robo-hives.”

“A man’s allowed to wallow now and then,” Wimberley grumbled.

“Not when there’s work to do! Get it together, your malignant majesty. I’m gonna wake you up now, but it’s gonna be hard work and you’re gonna need to do your part.”

“Click-9, I’m not malingering… I honestly don’t know that I have the capacity for any more hard work at this time. My tank feels empty.”

They gave his shoulder a quick squeeze. “Do your best. You wanna come home, yeah?”

Home. Cold, gleaming walls. Serpentine pipes. Engines humming and fans spinning and elevators sliding softly from deck to deck. A swimming pool. Fresh laundry. Yes, yes, yes. Bring me home.

He expected it to feel like being lifted from a dark, chilly pit and into the sunlight. It was more akin to being pulled free of a thorny thicket, new wounds opening up with every inch of progress. He tried to cooperate, but instinct told him to freeze in place, to keep as still as possible until the agony went away.

“Almost there!” said Click-9.

It took all Wimberley’s willpower not to beg them to stop.

The first thing he noticed upon returning to the waking world was that his screaming sounded peculiar. Not that one’s own screams were ever charming to one’s own ears – nonetheless, he knew at once that something had changed.

Ah. I don’t have a tongue anymore. Or a jaw.

He stopped screaming and started taking stock.

The entire lower half of his face was metal. No lips, no mouth, no chin, really, just a cold grid running from philtrum to collarbone, from which the screams had been broadcast.

What else? His left shoulder and… huh. His left arm was now three left arms, all metal, one ending in a hand-shape, the other two in a nozzle and a drill, respectively.

And lower… he lifted his hands, the flesh one and the metal one, and patted about… yes, skin from collarbone to sternum, then a combination of metal and plastic from sternum to groin.

What had happened to his dick? He’d wait until he was alone to check.

As ever, thoughts of genitals only ever lead in one direction.

Oh, crumbs. Ziklag’s going to be furious with me, isn’t he? He’ll think I did this on purpose. And I didn’t! Perhaps I was going to – perhaps I was toying with the idea – but I didn’t! I absolutely don’t deserve-…

“Wimberley! Hello? Hi? You there?” shouted a teenager with purple hair who Wimberley belatedly recognised as Click-9 in their hated human mode.

“Give him a second, damn,” said Trench, tugging her friend back. “He’s got, like, trauma and stuff.”

Wimberley tried to sit up, and found he could. He tried to turn to face them, and found he could. Legs were still mostly dead weight, though they seemed to have regained some feeling, but his arms were as strong as ever – stronger, perhaps. He still had a belly. It was covered by something slightly tougher and colder than skin, and there were interesting tubes running in and out of it. Nonetheless, it bulged and sagged and squished in all the usual ways.

Maybe Ziklag will forgive me.

“Thank you,” he said to Click-9 and Trench, through his new speakers. Humility didn’t come naturally to him, but he recognised the magnitude of the moment. “You – er – you’ve done well. Gone above and beyond the call of duty. I’m in your debt.”

“We want promotions,” Click-9 informed him, as they folded back into their normal shape. “I wanna be our organisation’s Director of Communications, Chief Marketing Officer, General Manager, Compliance Officer, Head of Human Resources, and Deputy Chairman of the Board. And Trench can be our comptroller.”

Trench frowned. “So I’m in charge of… computers? Trollies?”

“You make charts about money that no one looks at.”

“Yes, yes. Choose any titles you like,” said Wimberley, looking around for his cat. “Does anyone else know you’ve woken me up?”

“No, but -…”

“Keep it that way, for now. And get me up to date, quickly.”  

***

Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded sighed in contentment as the noonday sun beat down on their scales.

Life was good.

Not perfect. Not with the ever-present crowd of humans huddled behind a hastily-erected fence, holding up their phones and cameras while armed guards stood watch and tour guides hissed at them to keep their voices down.

But the rock below them was warm, the terrain surrounding them rough but not especially steep or perilous, and they’d found a nice flat spot all to themselves. Even though the mountain didn’t offer much in the way of prey, their belly was full – they’d instructed guards and guides both to allow their visitors to throw them the steaks, sausages, roast chickens, lamb cutlets, and biltong they routinely brought along in bulging shopping bags.

Humans, it turned out, had one redeeming quality; they were marvels when it came to food. They grilled it, fried it, steamed it, salted it, seasoned it – they had thousands of clever tricks, and all of them resulted in meals more sumptuous than Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded had ever believed possible.

My siblings are dead – my species is dust – the world I came from is long gone, and I shall never see its like again. On the other hand: fish fingers!

The humans gasped, cheered, and pointed as Sky descended.

She’d visited at least once a day over the last two weeks, sometimes just to check in, sometimes bringing a message from Snow that was invariably along the lines of: ‘Hope you’re well, wish you’d return to the fortress but I suppose it’s your life and not my place to tell you how to live it, please be terribly, terribly careful and we all hope to see you again soon’.

Occasionally, she’d acknowledged one of the dozens of questions the excited humans threw her way – ‘Where did you come from?’ – ‘Why are you here?’ – ‘Are you really aliens?’ – by launching into a lecture on recycling and eating less red meat. (Which, given the wonderful things humans could do with red meat, seemed like sheer wickedness to Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded, who told their audience as much every time Sky was out of earshot.)

Today, she’d brought Twitch.

“Hey there, kiddos!” the rat cried as he hopped off Sky’s back.

“Uncle!” chirped Samuel Taylor Coleridge, pushing the other chicks aside so he could head the welcoming committee. “Did you bring presents? Did you bring me presents? Will you come and live with us? Look how big I’ve grown! I chased down a spider yesterday, come see the corpse! I’ve pulled off five of its legs!”

“Ahem,” said Sky.

The young dinosaur flinched and hung his head. “Good morning, Miss Sky. It’s very nice to see you. I hope you’re well.”

“Thank you, little fellow. I am, indeed, well,” she said, turning to Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded. “Any problems? No? Good. If you’ll forgive me, I’ve no time to linger and chat today. Make sure Twitch stays out of trouble. I’ll be back before sunset.”

“Where are you going?” they asked.

“On a date.”

They watched as she flew off in the direction of the bay, where a second, larger albatross was riding the thermals.

“No way he’s good enough for her,” remarked Twitch. “But hey, glad she’s having fun for once.”

He approached, gave them a greeting sniff, and was sniffed in turn.

“I’m happy to see you,” they said.

Eyeing the restless crowd, he muttered, “Yeesh. Those guys bothering you?”

“No. If they do, I can easily frighten them off.”

“Nah – let me handle it if someone steps outta line. We’re celebrities now. Gotta think about our public image. There’s brats and moms with babies over there.”

“Mmm. Yes, perhaps you’re right,” they said, thinking back to their trampled brother. “By the way, Favourite needs a new tail. Again.”

“Growing up fast, huh? Lemme take a look. Maybe we can just make a few adjustments instead of replacing it.”

They dipped their head. “You are a worthy addition to this family.”

It was the highest praise they had ever offered anyone.

***

Snow dove into the ocean.

Oooooooooaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh.

So much better than the sterile, lukewarm water in Wimberley’s swimming pool, or the murky, muddy water of the pre-historic river.

This was what her body was made for. The surge, the churn, the chill – this was home.

And it already smelled better, only two weeks after they’d released the drones and turned on the fortress’s great filters.

“Doomhold says that they pose no threat to the bay’s ecosystem,” Valentina had told her. “She’s used them to remove contaminants and poisons from entire oceans – although it does tend to take a few hundred years. She says that, on other planets, she’s sped up the process by recruiting marine wildlife. Imagine – millions of fish on patrol, alerting us whenever there’s an oil spill or a ship in peril. Not that I think it’s a good idea… it feels wrong to meddle with so many lives just to make things easier for ourselves. But still. It would be a sight.”

“I’m – er – glad you two are getting on better lately,” said Snow.

(And she really was. It was obvious how much happier Val was now. Snow’s private discomfort with the situation – the awareness that every time she spoke to Valentina, she was also speaking to Doomhold – was her own problem and she was determined not to make a whole thing of it.)

“Does she…” Snow began, then fell silent.

“Does she what?”

“It’s stupid. I was going to ask if she thinks I’m doing well. If we’re doing well. Since she’s, you know, the expert. I’ve never tried to fix a planet before and I suppose I want some reassurance that I’m not making big mistakes without noticing. But it wouldn’t matter what her answer was, would it? I couldn’t trust it. Doomhold doesn’t want to be here. She wanted to retire and enjoy her cave in peace, and then she wanted to help Wimberley and Ziklag with their schemes. We’ve basically kidnapped her. Can’t do that and then ask for her approval.”

Val patted her shoulder and ran her fingers through her fur. “Perhaps not. Still, for what it’s worth, I have asked her, and she thinks you’re doing alright.”

We are. We really are, thought Snow as she broke surface. Major Zandeki says far less litter’s been washing up on the beach. Sky says she’s met far fewer seagulls with plastic around their necks. Mr Naqvi and his people ran those tests yesterday, and he smiled when he told me the results. I don’t think he smiles very often. We’re doing it. And yes, it’s just one bay, just one city, just a few hundred square miles of ocean – for now.

What might we do next?

She refused to entertain the thought for more than a second. As her mother had always said, you couldn’t hunt two seals at once and if you tried you’d lose both of them.

Focus on the present. Fixing things here might take years. It probably will, if we do it properly. Mr Naqvi’s right. Just cleaning up won’t mean anything in the long term if we can’t come to an agreement with the humans about how to keep it clean, and I’ve no idea how we’re going to do that.

The room in which Wimberley stored his many, many missiles flickered through her head.

I’ve no good, ethical, diplomatic ideas, she amended.

***

“I’ve brought you a book,” Waddles said, using his telekinesis to hand over a wodge of pages stapled messily together. “Got it from Snow, who got it from the internet. She’s been teaching us about this stuff for the last couple months and I think you might find it useful in your quest to become a less gross, stinky person.”

Ziklag took it, and read aloud: “‘Principles and Practicality from Socrates to Fanon: An Introduction to Moral Philosophy’. I’m assuming the last word is ‘philosophy’. Most of it’s covered by… is that tartar sauce?”

“It is! Major Zandeki came by today for another meeting and brought us even more presents, and a whole lotta food. She’s the best. Last time I mentioned to her that we all like fish, and she told the other humans, and now all the best chefs want us to try their recipes and say which one we like the most. Also the President of China’s giving us a plane so we can fly over there and visit, which is nice of him.”

“He’s not a president, you preposterous puffin, and he’s going to make political mincemeat of you. Him and every other autocrat alive.”

“Hey, gimme some credit. I only put three smiley faces in the thank-you letter, and only one heart. I know a lotta humans are bad. I’ve met you. But it’s nice they think we’re worth sucking up to.”

A piece of unstapled paper slipped from the book. Ziklag picked it up. It contained a series of multiple-choice questions.

“Fill that in when you’re done reading,” Waddles told him. “It’ll help you retain the information better.”

Crouching down to look him in the eye, Ziklag said, “When I noticed slackers trying to trick other students into doing their homework for them, I was always quick to report them to the principal. It didn’t make me any friends, but I had none to begin with.”

“Because you were a snitchin’ jerk?”

“Being a jerk who does his own homework pays off far more, in the long run, than being a cool, popular rebel who doesn’t. Hmm – your team leader put this test together, I assume? It must have taken her some time. And here you are, wasting all her hard work, because you don’t want to make an effort. Tell me, bird; is that how friends should be treated?”

Waddles left with an air of decided sullenness.

It was, thus far, the highlight of Ziklag’s month.

For two weeks now – ever since Valentina had announced her new arrangement with Doomhold – he’d been queasy. Wimberley still lay unconscious downstairs, his newly-augmented parts whirring and humming away while the rest of him remained disturbingly corpse-like. He didn’t have a heartbeat and he didn’t breathe. His skin, at least, was warm, and blood was moving around in there (Ziklag had checked), but these were small comforts.

And Doomhold wouldn’t finish the job.

Ziklag pestered her whenever he could find her, which had become harder and harder. She and Valentina seemed intent on making up for lost time. They went swimming in the morning and spent the afternoon taking long walks on the nearby beaches. Valentina helped the animals with their stupid clean-the-bay project, and Doomhold let her. Whenever Ziklag found them, they insisted that they needed to rush off to deal with some or other emergency and that they’d talk to him later.

I knew. I always knew. Wimberley was convinced he’d won her over. But I knew right from the beginning that she only ever considered us poor substitutes for her favourite.

Fear had taken root in Ziklag’s gut. What would he do if Doomhold decided not to revive Wimberley? If she no longer cared enough, or if Valentina convinced her it was for the best to leave him comatose forever?

What would he do?

The answer was currently in his pocket.

It was, he admitted, crude. He wasn’t a genius, like Wimberley. He couldn’t build wonders.

Breaking them – that was easy. You didn’t need to be a genius to do that. You just needed to understand, more or less, how a thing worked, what parts it needed, and what would happen when you removed them.

So down he’d gone, down and down and down, to the quiet, uninhabited deck where he and his sister had almost drowned not long ago, to the room with the crystals.

Doomhold would have stopped him. Valentina would have stopped him. But both of them were currently distracted with each other, and no one was captaining the ship.

The device in Ziklag’s pocket was a detonator. If pressed, a small explosion would knock the calefaction crystals on Sublevel D out of alignment. They would overheat, shutting down the hitch-swimmer turbines and causing a power surge that would ignite the fuel in the Verrain-Skarr pipes. And the last time that had happened…

“…widespread damage throughout core systems, including data loss, contamination of my coolant supplies, the severing of Drill C-3’s primary command lines, and the rupturing of the base of my hull… My hull has been torn open in twelve separate places, all below the water line. Unless the situation is rectified, I will be fully submerged in precisely twenty-two hours and six minutes.”

Except this time, it wouldn’t take that long. Major Zandeki had been ordered by her president to give the animals anything they needed, and last week she’d overseen the delivery of enough fuel to keep the fortress up and running for the next millennium. The hull wouldn’t be damaged. It would be obliterated.

Not that it would come to that. Putting a knife to Doomhold’s throat would be a last, last, last resort.

But I’ll do it. If she doesn’t bring him back, I’ll do it. 

Ziklag squared his shoulders, picked up his toolbox, and continued repairs on what he now had the power to destroy.

***

For all that his brother mocked him, Favourite was a sensible child and knew by now to keep still as his prosthetic was tweaked and tightened. He gave one of Twitch’s soft, delicate grey ears a perfectly polite bite, holding it between his teeth without tearing it, which demonstrated excellent self-control.

He’s not stupid just because he can’t talk. He’s not weak just because the end of his tail is detachable. He’s made it this far – adulthood is months away – he only needs a little more help, a little more encouragement…

“You have hundreds of living relatives, Twitch. Are any of them like him?” Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded asked. “Do they need devices to move properly?”

“Talk louder! We can’t hear you!” called one of the humans, holding up their phone. Several others repeated the demand, until the tour guides and guards shushed them.

Ignoring the crowd, Twitch said, “Dunno. Been a while since I hung out with ‘em.”

“Ah. Yes, you’ve quarrelled.”

(Over what, they weren’t sure. The rats had allied with Ziklag and fought Twitch and his friends, briefly, true – but it was perfectly normal for family members to fight one another. Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded had, in their youth, clawed out their larger, bullying sister’s left eye to teach her a lesson. They’d gone hunting together the next day. Life was too short and too dangerous to hold grudges.)

“It’s not just that!” said Twitch. “They’ve all been such jerks since Doomhold turbo-charged their brains. They’ve got opinions now. They’ve got politics. Yesterday I ran into a couple of my cousins and they wanted to know what I thought about representative democracy, and whether presidential republics are better than parliamentary republics, because they’re thinking of forming a government. I said I’d never thought about it much. That got ‘em real snippy. They said I was ‘complacent’. I’m like: ‘Assholes, did you almost get stepped on by a brontosaurus?’”

As he’d spoken, a human child had pushed its way to the front of the crowd.

Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded knew almost nothing about human children. But they were a parent, and had been a parent for many years. Every experienced, halfway competent parent, regardless of species, can recognise the tell-tale signs of a child who is bored and about to cause problems for fun.

The child’s wandering gaze fell on Twitch.

“Ew!” it cried. “A rat! Gross!”

It picked up a rock, and threw it.

***

Snow and Valentina were planning the team’s next lesson – tentatively titled ‘A Brief History of Propaganda and Reputation Laundering’, because Waddles had been asking if they could accept one or two of the invitations they’d received from world leaders, particularly those from leaders of those parts of the world where his favourite movies were made, and while they couldn’t hope to hold back their teammate’s dreams forever they could at least ensure that he went in with his eyes open – when the call came in.

“We can’t risk using the teleporter,” said Valentina, breaking into a run. “Might send us back to the Jurassic, or into the sun. Gotta be a boat.”

A quick, urgent message to Major Zandeki resulted in a boat becoming available mere minutes later.

No one wanted to leave Ziklag alone and unsupervised in the fortress, so they took him along.

“Behave yourself,” Snow snapped. “Don’t test me. Not today.”

“What about the others? His sister and the robots?” asked Waddles.

There wasn’t much room on the boat, and Snow didn’t want extra weight to slow them down, so she said, “They’re less dangerous than he is. And they’re still confined to the lower decks. All the doors are sealed.”

“Where are you?” Sky shouted over the com. “Hurry! There’s blood everywhere!”

“There are excellent vets in the city,” Zandeki told Snow as they shot across the water. “They can get there before we can.”

“No! No one touches him but us!” Waddles shouted.

“Don’t be stupid, Waddles,” Valentina scolded him. “Major – please, send over anyone who can help. Doomhold can fix even very serious injuries, but Twitch needs to be alive when we get there.”

“So does the boy,” noted Ziklag, “if you don’t want an angry mob on your hands. How badly hurt is he, Zandeki?”

Phone to her ear, she shook her head. “My people aren’t there yet, and everyone who is is giving me a different story. He’s alive, for the moment.”

Waddles flapped his flippers in agitation. “Who cares? If Twitch doesn’t make it, I’m gonna kill that evil brat myself!”

“Everyone, shut up!” Snow roared. “I’m trying to hear Sky! Sky, say that again, please?”

“An ambulance just arrived. Paramedics are getting out. Faster Eggs is growling at them.”

“No! No growling! Tell them to stay calm, stay quiet, and do absolutely nothing until we get there!”

In any other circumstances, Snow would have been excited to experience a real human city for the very first time. Real roads. Real taxis. Real skyscrapers. She’d been looking forward to it.

But this was a rescue mission, not the fun excursion she’d hoped for, and all she could process were the parts directly relevant to their goal. They made it ashore. A truck was waiting. They climbed into the back while Zandeki shouted instructions to the driver. A dozen cars with flashing red lights escorted them away from the port, through the towering buildings, and up the mountainside. The minutes ticked by. Snow started to plan for worst-case scenarios.

I’ve gotten better at this, she thought. I should be a wreck. Shaking with guilt and fear. Instead, all I really feel is impatient. Everything else is locked up in a glacier. Is that what leadership means? Being able to decide what you feel, and when you let yourself feel it? Is that maturity? Can Val do it, too? I suppose she can. When I was poisoned, she didn’t go to pieces. She kept it together. Got the job done. Saved me.

She glanced at Ziklag, who was gazing out the back of the truck at the city.

It’s a dangerous skill to have. If you can teach yourself to turn off your regrets, you become capable of all sorts of awful things.

“I’m sorry for snapping at you, sweetheart,” Val was telling Waddles, stroking his feathers gently. “You don’t have to leave the truck when we get there, if you’re frightened.”

Burying his beak in her shirt, he said, “I’ve seen my friends die before. I’m not scared. Just mad. Why would a human do something so cruel, when we’re trying to help them? Twitch wasn’t even bothering the kid! He didn’t do anything wrong! And it’s not like the kid was hungry and wanted to eat him! I’d get that! Being hungry sucks! But he wasn’t!”

“If it’s any consolation, the boy’s life is ruined,” Ziklag commented.

“What, because Eggs bit him? Pfft! They didn’t even take off the whole arm!”

“No. Because everyone saw him throw the rock. Dozens of people recorded it on their phones. Whatever he might have wanted to grow up to be, whatever future his parents may have dreamed of for him, it’s all over now. He’ll only ever be ‘that awful child who made the aliens hate us’. I’ll lay odds he swallows a bullet before thirty.”

“Good!” Waddles snarled.

When they got there, and found that Twitch was still alive, the first thing Waddles did was shuffle over to the ambulance where Twitch’s assailant sat, bracketed by his mother and father while a paramedic examined his wound, and asked if they were all alright and if he could do anything to help.

“I’m sure you weren’t just being nice,” Snow said to Ziklag, “but thank you, nonetheless. Whatever your sinister ulterior motives.”

“You think I want him joining the dark side? Another feral adolescent? I already have my hands full dealing with Click-9,” Ziklag retorted.

Twitch, trying to keep as still as he could while Valentina looked at his leg, said, “What’s the douchebag doing here? And where’s our douchebag?”

“Here,” answered Sky, landing beside him, a bag full of medical supplies hanging from her beak. “The paramedics gave me these, in case we were short.”

They weren’t short, but Snow appreciated the gesture.

Though the vets had arrived speedily, none of them wanted to approach their patient, because Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded was coiled around their chicks, who were in turn coiled around Twitch. As per Snow’s instructions, they weren’t growling. This did not in any way lessen the impression that the huddled, frightened family would readily maim any human who came an inch too close.

“Hey – are you okay?” Snow asked.

“It wasn’t the rock,” they said, uncharacteristically subdued.

“What?”

“I saw the rock coming at him. Moved to block it. Succeeded – and, in the process, I accidentally stepped on him. I crushed his leg beneath my foot.”

“Oh… oh, that… you can’t blame yourself.”

“I don’t, Snow. Though I do regret biting the hateful child. The adults reacted with unexpected ferocity. They rushed at me. Threw things at the chicks. I thought they’d overwhelm and kill us. Even though I didn’t do permanent harm! A few drops of blood, that was all. Maybe a scar. The child won’t even lose the arm, which seems unfair given that Twitch will most certainly lose his leg.”

From what Snow had seen, the leg was already lost. All that remained was cutting away the bloody bag of pulverised muscle and bone it had become.

“You -…” Snow began.

“I shouldn’t have left the fortress. Yes. I realise this. The bird has already expressed her contempt for my actions in very plain language, you need not -…”

“You kept Twitch safe. Thank you. Thank you for protecting my friend. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to help. I should’ve been. Should have realised what might happen. Shouldn’t have left you alone. Now stand up. We’re going to talk to the humans. We’re going to apologise.”

Their face-feathers flared. “No! Intolerable!”

“Now,” Snow growled. “Use your brain. See how many of them there are? See all the tools they have – all the things they’ve built? If they decide we’re their enemies, we will die. All of us. I won’t let that happen, certainly not just to spare your pride.”

“They threw the rock! They were in the wrong! Demanding I apologise is unjust!”

“Yes. It is. Justice isn’t what I care about. Waddles is the one who wants to live in a comic book. I just want to get things done. Up. Now.”

***

Back at the fortress, in the cold, dark room where he’d been feigning unconsciousness for two weeks, Wimberley risked cracking an eye open and whispered across the com link he shared with Click-9, “Have they gone?”

“Affirmative, my lard-assed liege. They left some drones on patrol in the hallways, but I’m disabling ‘em as we speak. Arise!”

Parabola strutted in with a happily question-marked-shaped tail and went ‘raa-aarp!’ in greeting. He settled into his chair before picking her up and stroking her firmly, kissing her little head and cooing words of love and devotion.

***

The stars were out by the time the boat carried them all home.

“We’ll build you a replacement,” Valentina told Twitch, cradling him. “Doomhold revived me after I drowned – fixed Wimberley after the acid dissolved his whole left side – replacing one leg will be easy. You won’t even notice the difference.”

“Nope,” said Twitch, the painkillers slurring his speech. “Not for me, thanks. I’ve got maybe a year and a half left to live and I ain’t spending it learning how to use brand new robot parts. Plenty of my relatives have three legs. I’ll be fine.”

“Can I have robot parts?” Samuel Taylor Coleridge asked his parent.

“No,” said Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded, grooming him.

“Unfair! Favourite gets to have robot parts!”

Eating a gourmet vegan burger – one of many gifts from the crowd on the beach who’d seen them off – Ziklag said to Snow, “You’ve a talent for public speaking, bear. Not that I expected them to throw rotten tomatoes with all the soldiers present, but the applause was a surprise.”

“I suppose you and Wimberley would have killed the boy,” she replied. “If we hadn’t beat you – if you were the ones running things, and someone had defied you. You’d want to make an example of them. Hmph. Won’t pretend it’s not appealing. I felt like a total idiot, standing there begging everyone to forgive one another and try to get along. They felt sorry for me, I could tell. I could hear them snickering. They wouldn’t have snickered if I’d eaten that kid in front of them.”

“You are badly in need of a holiday,” Sky opined. “Let’s do something fun tomorrow. That tiny island in the bay – let’s visit it. You can meet my boyfriend and hunt seals.”

Sourly, feeling that she’d earned a sulk, Snow replied, “Don’t like the seals here. Too furry. And they’ve got ears. That’s just wrong. Seals shouldn’t have ears.”

“They weren’t snickering,” said Valentina… only it wasn’t Valentina, not anymore. Snow instinctively straightened up. “They were whispering amongst themselves, it’s true. They didn’t know what to make of you. But there was no mockery and certainly no pity. You made an impression, child. It was a good speech. My congratulations. Keep charming them like that and they’ll give you no trouble.”

Crikey. Crumbs. “Er – that’s – you – thanks.”

Doomhold gazed across the water at her true body. “Wimberley wouldn’t have bothered talking to them. Apologising wouldn’t have occurred to him.”

“He’s not a natural orator. So what?” Ziklag spat. “Are you suggesting that matters more than intellect? More than drive and ambition? He’s bled for you. He let you strip-mine his brain. Would the bear do that?”

Coolly, Doomhold replied, “The point is moot. Whatever his ambitions, he’s not presently capable of pursuing them.”

“Because you haven’t finished healing him, you battered old box!”

“I’ve made considerable progress. But you must understand that he was very badly injured. The acid melted through his skull. It could be months until it’s safe to wake him up – maybe years…”

Ziklag’s fists clenched. “And in the meantime, you’ll give Valentina’s pets free rein to pursue their stupid, pointless, after-school-special dreams! Saving the whales and picking up garbage and ultimately changing nothing, while every army in the world develops ways to defend itself against the fortress’s power, until ultimately you lose your leverage entirely. Is that what you want? To end up as an impotent tourist attraction, on a nice clean beach with nice clean waters, while the world dies around you?”

“The world won’t die, Ziklag. Worlds are very resilient. Some humans may die, yes, if your species’ failures keep stacking up and your governments don’t change course. But why should Snow prioritize saving humans? You got yourselves into this mess.”

“I’m not prioritizing anyone!” Snow protested, hotly. “I want to help everybody – and sorry, I don’t agree that picking up garbage changes nothing. It’s a way in. It’ll prove to the humans that we have their best interests at heart. We can only bring about real, lasting change by working with them. There’s no better option. Ziklag, do you truly believe you can point a gun at eight billion people and force them to behave?”

“In the short term? Yes! And the short term is what matters!” Ziklag replied. “We’ve left it too late to be polite and persuasive! You and your team of Care Bears can win their hearts and minds after I’ve ensured that the entire global agriculture system isn’t going to fucking collapse!”

“Ziklag, you and Wimberley had your chance,” said Doomhold, firmly. “I’m grateful to you, make no mistake. I’d given up. No longer saw the point in saving things. You two – you roused my interest. Your enthusiasm was infectious. Your plan was… well, it might have worked. But I’m just not convinced you have what it takes. So now it’s my step-daughter’s turn,” said Doomhold, and gave Snow something close to Valentina’s warm smile, except worse in every way. “And I have confidence in her.”

***

“I need to prove that I can do better,” said Wimberley, as they approached the elevator.

Scratching at her burn scars – he made a mental note to ask if she’d like cosmetic surgery – Trench replied, “Why? Prove to who?”

“He means Doomhold,” Click-9 told her.

Wimberley nodded. “Quite. I fear she’s given up on me. On us. One too many failures – and we never could hold a candle to her Valiant. That’s why she didn’t wake me up, and why she’s been content to let us languish in the basement. She’s decided to let the bloody animals try to fix things. A damning indictment indeed. So! Time to be bold. We’re going to show her what we’re made of, my accomplices.”

“Ziklag’s gonna be so mad we didn’t tell him you’re back,” Trench said, grimacing.

“Couldn’t risk it. Your brother can’t lie to save his life. What if he’d accidentally spilled the beans to the bear or the penguin?”

“Still gonna be mad.”

“He’ll understand. He always understands.”

Wimberley was pleased and surprised to discover that Click-9 had learned some new tricks in his absence, including overriding Valentina’s commands to keep the elevator doors from opening.

“Not like I’ve had much else to do while we’ve been stuck down here,” they said. “I tried teaching Dr Phlegmatic to play Scrabble, but he kept letting me win. I tried to read War and Peace – couldn’t make it past Page Three. So instead I started making a list of how many of Mom’s systems I could screw with while her back’s turned. Guess what? It’s a lot! I could probably take us into space right now if I felt like it. You guys wanna go to space?”

“No,” said Wimberley, grinning. “I want to go to the command centre.”

***

Everyone aboard the boat gasped, cried out, or dove for cover as the fortress suddenly blazed with light. Red lights, green lights, white lights, gold lights, dozens of shades shining from every corner of every deck. It was brighter than the moon, brighter than the metropolis behind them.

“Why’s it doing that? What is it doing?” demanded Major Zandeki.  

She was thrown off her feet as the boat rocked violently in waves created by the fortress’s rising from the ocean, its mighty anti-gravity engines roaring like an awakened beast.

“You!” shouted Snow, turning to Ziklag. “This is some scheme of yours, isn’t it? You told Trench and Click-9 to do this!”

But he looked as baffled as everyone else, and only shook his head.

“Whoever’s doing it hasn’t sealed down the fortress yet,” said Sky. “Snow – I’m going in.”

“Alone?”

“Look at it! It’s already too high up for any of you! And if they do shut down all the entry points, we’re stuffed! They’ll be in full control and we’ll be stuck out here!”

“Sky, it’s dangerous.”

“I won’t engage. I’ll just find out who’s doing this and how, then report back.”

“What if it locks down while you’re in there and you get trapped?”

“Then at least you’ll have one agent on the inside. Our coms are working – I’ll tell you our enemy’s movements so you can plan a counterattack. Snow, I don’t think we have time to argue about this. What if it’s not Trench and Click-9? What if someone dangerous found their way in there, somehow – mercenaries sent by a government that covets the fortress’s power, or common thieves? This might be our only chance to stop them before they use it to start World War Three! Do I have your permission?”

“Damn it – yes. Yes. Go. Be careful!”

Sky flew off.

“What’re you all arguing about?” slurred Twitch. “Where’s she going?”

“Will someone please explain what’s happening?” Major Zandeki pleaded.

“Right now, we know about as much as you do,” Snow told her.

The floating fortress was changing shape, from a cube to a diamond. From its smooth, symmetrical sides, fang-like protrusions were emerging, the biggest of which tilted until it was pointing directly towards the city.

“Sky!” Snow shouted.

“Yes, I see it,” came Sky’s voice over the com. “Don’t worry, I’ll – ah!”

Snow, distantly aware that Val was screaming, watched as her friend bounced off the fortress’s newly-activated forcefield and plummeted.

“Hold on – I can catch her,” said Waddles, the device that controlled his telekinesis starting to hum.

The fortress’s primary cannon fired.

A red line split the starscape in two, and Sky was gone.

The water shimmered. Settled. The boat stopped rocking. Favourite was cheeping and chirping in confusion and distress.

In the mountain looming over the city was a perfectly circular hole, at least three hundred metres in diameter.

A phone rang.

It was Major Zandeki’s.

She took it out of her pocket, stared at it, then turned it around so everyone could see what was on the screen.

“Wimberley?” Ziklag gasped.

“Greetings, fellow inhabitants of Planet Earth!” said Wimberley. “I’ll keep this brief. My name is Wimberley and I am now in charge.”

The end

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To be fair, that had, initially, been half the point. He’d wanted to waste some time. After sixteen years at the academic grindstone, he’d needed a break. His mother, upon hearing this, had said it was an excellent idea and an opportunity to ‘broaden his social life’. He knew what that meant. She wanted him married, and soon. She’d had no real use for him since the accident, but his genes still had potential.

So he’d fled to the other side of the world, using the archaeology degree he’d only completed to annoy her and his father as an excuse. Half a year or so in the wilderness digging up bones, and hopefully by the time he returned to the university he’d not feel quite so much like killing every single one of his peers.

Yes; wasting time had been the goal.

But somewhere along the way, his research had convinced him that there might actually be something to find out here. Not dusty old Brachytrachelopan fossils, as he’d told his crew. Something big. Something extraordinary.

After a month in a tent, being nibbled by bugs and blinded by the sun, awakened to the fact that he truly despised nature and having had to replace his wheels three times thanks to the rough terrain, he felt like a bloody idiot. There was nothing here.

I should have gone to France. Spent a year sipping wine and working on my novels. Maybe had a sordid affair or two.

“Oi – you,” he shouted to another of the grunts – Butch, or Bruce, or something. “Go check on the interns. See if they’ve made any progress.”

Wimberley had three interns, and was sure they all loathed him. They were bright, cream of the crop; could have worked anywhere. They’d followed him out here because of his glittering reputation, certain that he knew what he was doing. Then the nurse he’d hired had caught malaria and gone home, and he’d had to rely on them more heavily than he’d planned to. Now they saw him for what he was; an obese, maudlin cripple who complained constantly and only occasionally had the strength to help them dig.

I wonder how much more I’ll have to annoy them before they push me deep into one of the caves and leave me to die. It must have crossed their minds. Plenty of nice, dark places to hide a corpse down there. Can’t be much longer before someone snaps.

“Right – I’ve had enough of you, you bastard!”

Oh ho. Speak of the devil.

Not an intern. One of the interchangeable grunts had broken away from his sullen, cigarette-smoking comrades and was storming towards him with jaw and fists clenched. Wimberley didn’t think they’d exchanged a single word up to this point.

And how angry he looked!

“They’re predicting twelve inches of rain and gale force winds!” the grunt snapped, planting himself in front of Wimberley with arms folded and pectorals swelling as though the man’s torso were a Macy’s Day Parade float. “This terrain’s dangerous even in ideal conditions! Do you mean to kill us all?”

This is, undeniably, the best thing that’s happened to me all day.

“That rocky outcropping there will shelter us from the wind,” said Wimberley, “and our camping gear is military-grade – I should know, I paid for it myself – and more than sufficient to keep us safe and dry. Moreover, the forecast is wrong. I checked it myself yesterday. The storm will veer eastwards; we’ll only suffer its tail. Three inches of rain at worst.”

He’d hoped this attempt at de-escalation would fail, and it did.

“‘Wrong’?” said his opponent. “Those who predict the weather for a living are wrong and you, a man who can barely read a map and who mistook cougar dung for goat dung, are correct? Where does this astonishing arrogance spring from?”

To hell with de-escalation, Wimberley thought happily. Let’s go down in glorious flames.

He shook his head in mock-contrition. “Ah – forgive me. You’re quite right. Why would I, with only three PhDs and twenty-eight ground-breaking papers to my name, assume to know better than some mediocre meteorologist? Furthermore, how dare I ask the people I’m paying and recruited specifically for their ability to operate in harsh conditions to endure a few hours of bad weather without whimpering?”

He half-expected a punch.

Instead, the man huffed and dropped to one knee.

“Even if you don’t care what happens to us,” he said, low and gruff, “you should give a damn about your own safety. We are many, many miles from the nearest hospital.”

“Don’t kneel,” Wimberley ordered, flustered. “Ever. I don’t need men to be below my eye level to converse with them. I’ve been looking up at acquaintances my entire life and am happy to continue doing so. And – and I shall be perfectly safe. In fact, I’ll put my money where my mouth is. I’m no coward. I will remain at work in Cave A for the duration of the storm.”

***

Cave A was their primary excavation site. It was the only one Wimberley could visit in person; for the others, he had to rely on the interns and their two wheeled autonomous robots.

It was home to a great many bats, but in all other respects was as comfortable as a cave could be. Airy. Temperate. Wide as two tennis courts. The floor sloped so gently it was almost flat.

Even so, staying inside it during a downpour was, if you had the option of being anywhere else, a stupid idea. Four streams drained directly into it. If there really were twelve inches of rain, as predicted, the water level in the cave would rise to about seven feet. There wouldn’t be – he was confident – but even a moderate amount would make the rocks slippery and the dirt road outside treacherous.

Dishevelment was inevitable. Injury was entirely possible. Death, not out of the question.

Wimberley considered backing down.

No. The humiliation would be intolerable.

Thus it was that two in the afternoon saw him leaning on his heavy duty steel walker, clad in two raincoats, Wellington boots, and a hardhat with an attached headlamp, staring grimly at a stalagmite.

“Alright – you’ve proved your point. Can we leave now?” said his companion.

His name, Wimberley had learned, was Ziklag Procházka, age thirty-four. He seemed not to have befriended his co-workers, given that none of them were down here with him. Wimberley suspected that this was attributable to his obvious struggles with emotional regulation. He’d reacted to Wimberley’s proclamation with braying mockery. Then, upon realising Wimberley fully intended to go through with it, he’d followed him around for hours, increasingly frantic as the clouds gathered, trying to dissuade him. Now he paced, grumbling under his breath, shooting fretful looks at the cave’s narrow entrance as though he expected Saint Marcellus’s Flood to come surging through at any moment.

It was pathetic. It was amusing. It made Wimberley want to conduct unethical psychological experiments upon him.

“Certainly not. I’m making unprecedented progress,” Wimberley lied, pulling his woollen hat down over his chilly ears.  

Outside, thunder rumbled.

Ziklag approached. Loomed over the stalagmite, and over him too. Even standing, Wimberley was a foot shorter. “Are you? Because you’re not making notes, or taking samples, or even drumming your fingers the way you do when you’re thinking deeply. Is there even anything left to accomplish here? I thought this horrid hole had already been thoroughly gone-over by your pallid acolytes.”

(He couldn’t seem to speak without moving his hands. Several gestures and mannerisms, when combined with his well-manicured nails and habitual sultry pout, lead Wimberley to conclude that he was both a homosexual – more progressive terms hadn’t been used in Wimberley’s childhood home and he’d not been sufficiently social or empathetic to adopt them in adulthood – and an inveterate flirt.)

“Do you mean the interns?” asked Wimberley. “Why do you talk like that?”

The faintest wet smatterings began darkening the rocks by the cave entrance. Tree branches creaked as the wind picked up.

Shifting his weight from one long leg to the other, Ziklag said, “Why are you here? You don’t like the environment. You don’t care about the work. You can’t stand any of us. And you’re clever enough and rich enough to do most anything else. So why are you putting yourself through this?”

Unconsciously, Wimberley bared his teeth. No subordinate, no matter how amusing, was allowed to make a specimen of him. “You’re distracting me. Go away.”

As Ziklag stalked off, he lowered himself to a handy rock. Standing up again would be the hardest part of his day, but fuck it. Fuck everything. Maybe he’d get lucky and have a massive coronary before he had to.

The rain strengthened over the next hour, turning the outside world into a grey wall. It got colder. He drank half his flask of Earl Grey and ate a biscuit. He took out a pad of paper and sketched the stalagmite.

Ziklag returned just as Wimberley was starting to wonder whether he’d tripped and broken his neck.

He was filthy, wet, and excited.

“I found a tunnel!” he said.

***

“It’s not on the map,” said the intern, as rained drummed hard on the tent. “You probably went down Fleichmann’s Passage.”

“I did not! That’s in an entirely different location! I turned left here,” Ziklag insisted, stabbing the map with his finger, which was still covered in mud and left a stain.

His arse gets perkier when he’s petulant, Wimberley noted with interest.

“It’s easy to get disoriented down there, especially if you’re not a professional cave freak like us,” said the young woman, kindly.

“I wasn’t disoriented! I was following a noise!”

“A noise?”

“Singing! I heard singing!”

As the interns left, Wimberley heard one mutter to the other a sentence that included the phrase ‘drinking on the job’.

“I don’t drink,” Ziklag told him. “Barely ever. I never drink to excess. I am meticulous about my health. There was singing. Music. Very faint, but I heard it. The tunnel I found was narrow and slippery – dangerous, which was why I turned back. I’m not lying or making it up. I give you my word.”

It seemed very important to him that Wimberley believe him. Wimberley couldn’t think of a reason why it would be unless he was telling the truth. Well, no, in fact he could think of several – but none of them fit with the impression he was forming of the man’s personality.

“We’ll go back when the rain’s stopped and you can show me,” he said, placatory, like they’d been married twenty years and his husband wanted help identifying a weed in the garden.

***

He could see immediately why no one had found the tunnel before now.

The entrance was tiny.

“You fit in there?” he said, leaning forward as far as he could. He was unable to stand at all today and was using the chair that was good at navigating bumpy surfaces (but also damned uncomfortable to sit in for too long).

Ziklag preened. “I do yoga. I’m flexible.”

“You’re a damned fool. You could have very easily gotten stuck. Ever heard of Nutty Putty? Nasty way to die.”

“It widens considerably after the first yard or so. I was able to proceed on all fours for almost half an hour, and I could have gone farther.”

Deploying one of their expedition’s two camera-equipped robots confirmed this account. Moreover, it proved that the tunnel continued for another fifty yards, steadily growing wider until it opened out into a great underground cavern, which they only glimpsed for a second before the camera suddenly and inexplicably died.

“How on Earth…? Those things cost a fortune!” Wimberley snarled.

“Shut up – we’re still getting audio,” said Ziklag. “Listen. Listen.”

He reached over and pushed the volume up as high as it would go.

Slowly, Wimberley turned to him. “Am I insane, or is that ‘Go Go Power Rangers’?”

***

They lost all contact with the robot five minutes later.

“Don’t tell the others about this,” Wimberley instructed Ziklag as they returned to camp. “I don’t want to spook them.”

Ziklag snorted. “Liar. You think there might be something remarkable down there and you want all the credit for yourself.”

“I’ll get the credit regardless. This is my expedition. But I want to be sure of the facts before opening my mouth. It’s entirely possible the camera simply malfunctioned. It’s entirely possible you were high, or that I hallucinated the music as a result of some as-yet-undiagnosed brain tumour. Before I say a word to the minions, I want hard proof of our discovery. I will not be made to look like a buffoon.”

“Very well. Keep your secrets. I’m going to have dinner and jog.”

Wimberley pretended not to be surprised when Ziklag visited his tent that night.

“Is that for my benefit?” he asked, gesturing to the gun Wimberley was polishing.

“No. I’m generally uninterested in sports, machismo, that sort of thing… but I have a morbid fascination with weaponry,” said Wimberley, setting it aside. “I design missiles in my spare time.”

Ziklag zipped the tent shut before coming to stand before him.

“I like weapons too!” he announced.

“Is that so?”

“It is. I have a modest collection of antique knives. Why does kneeling bother you?”

“Eh. It always strikes me as…”

“Theatrical? I should warn you that I’m a lifelong theatre fan.”

“No. No. A closer word is ‘deceptive’.”

“Kneeling is deceptive?”

Wimberley picked at a scab on his neck. “Yee-eeees. Or, at least, it feels that way to me. It’s supposed to signify humility and submission. But it’s false. A man who kneels does it because he thinks it makes him look good. Either noble or romantic or attractive. It’s self-aggrandisement disguised as self-effacement, and I hate that sort of thing.”

“Ah. You prefer genuine humility.”

“No. I prefer undisguised arrogance.”

The collapsible bed squeaked pitifully as Ziklag planted himself upon it, removed his shirt, and lay back against the pillows with his arms folded behind his head. “Good.”

Joining him took a while. Wimberley’s bed at home was made easily accessible by straps and handrails. Without them, the process was far more tedious and, he feared, lacked dignity.

“Will this take much longer?” Ziklag enquired, all sugared innocence.

“Your passable features don’t compensate for your extraordinary bad manners,” Wimberley hissed.

“Happily, I have other qualities that do. For example!” he said, and hoovered an impressive percentage of Wimberley’s left tit into his mouth.

***

“I am not interested in a romantic relationship at this time,” said Wimberley, lighting a cigar.

A pause – a half-second too long. Then Ziklag replied, “Understood. Can I still work for you?”

“Yes.”

“Can we have sex again?”

“Yes.”

“And might there be a chance, at some point, however far in the future, that you would become interested in a romantic relationship?”

Wimberley blew a smoke ring and briefly visualised purchasing lightbulbs and broccoli with Ziklag, a man who assuredly ate a lot of broccoli. “Yes – but by that point, you’ll have moved on. Settled down in a trendy neighbourhood with a beautiful artistic twink who takes you rollerblading on weekends.”

“Mmm. We shall see. Put that filthy thing away before you give me lung cancer.”  

***

It was the size of a fork, with ten long, thin, flexible legs. Smaller and more nimble than any alternatives currently on the market, it had the potential to make Wimberley even wealthier than he currently was (or, from his parents’ perspective, slightly less embarrassingly poor) if he sold it. He had no plans to do so. It was his. The thought of it being mass-produced, reduced to another toy for consumerist dullards, made him seethe with possessive wrath.

“It’s equipped with a far more powerful, far more resilient camera,” he boasted as it skittered into the tunnel.

“You really made that yourself? As a hobby?” asked Ziklag, his obvious awe sending pleasurable shivers all the way down Wimberley’s spine and its pedicle screws.

“I call it ‘Click’. Because -…”

“Because of the noise it makes, yes. I gathered. You’re uncreative, for a brilliant inventor. I’d have named it ‘Coricopat’. Or ‘Amonasro’.”

“My mother used to say that self-proclaimed homosexual men who enjoyed musical theatre weren’t really homosexuals, at their core, because real homosexuals had taste.”

“My God, she sounds awful. Luckily for you, I’m willing to share mine. She’s fun! And a psychiatrist for serial child killers and the like, so she’ll probably find your glaring personality flaws quaint and charming. How about ‘Gavroche’?”

“I’m hoping that one day my creation will be intelligent enough to choose a name for itself.”

“Ugh. You’re one of those people who believes that we can invent machines that can actually think.”

“Think, feel, make choices. One day.”

“Poppycock. You can’t build a soul.”

“Silence, ignoramus. Click’s picking something up,” said Wimberley, studying his laptop.

It wasn’t music. This time, all they heard was a deep, throbbing hum, occasionally varying in pitch and volume.

“Sounds like a giant laundry machine,” Ziklag commented.

On the screen, the cavern reappeared. It was immense – a quarter mile wide, at least – but what held their attention were its contents.

I was right, thought Wimberley, trembling, trying to maintain his composure. I was right.

“What the devil?” Ziklag murmured. “Wait – something’s moving!”

Wimberley squinted at the screen. Then his hands shot to his wheels. “Get back. Get back. Now!”

They escaped the danger zone just in time, making it halfway to the exit before spiders began to pour out of the tunnel, first dozens, then hundreds. Fast buggers they were, too; Wimberley emerged into sunlight to find five climbing his legs. Ziklag swore, knocked them off with the back of his hand, then seized the chair and pushed like mad.

***

It wasn’t long before their camp was completely overrun.

“This doesn’t make sense! Spiders don’t behave like this!” one of the interns cried, swatting them away with a notebook.

One of the men turned out to be arachnophobic and quit immediately, taking a truck. An intern seized the opportunity and rode back to civilisation with him.

They relocated the camp. The spiders followed them. The next day, they were joined by a swarm of scorpions.

“Our new friend is mean-spirited!” Ziklag declared, plucking one off Wimberley’s pillow with thick leather gloves to avoid being stung.

Mean-spirited? Wimberley thought. It lives at the bottom of a cave system that is over fifty thousand years old. It sings human songs. It can destroy equipment. It can control animals. It’s dangerous.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so thrilled.

Three more men left the next day. The rest stood their ground until the snakes arrived.

***

A dry wind whistled across the rocky landscape, rustling the wildflowers that had sprung up after the rain. Wimberley and Ziklag huddled alone in the last remaining tent, listening to the army of arachnids and reptiles circling them outside.

“Option one,” said Ziklag. “I go out there with my gun and shoot all of them.”

“You don’t have enough bullets.”

“Alright. Option two: I go out there and ask them politely to leave.”

Wimberley eyeballed the half-litre of water they had left. There were ten litres more in the back of the truck, fifty yards away. “I suppose this is how it’s prevented others from finding it over the eons.”

“What is it?” Ziklag pressed. “You must have some idea. It can’t be a coincidence that you decided to dig for dinosaur bones in exactly the right spot to awaken it.”

After typing in several lengthy passwords – he’d not wanted the interns snooping – Wimberley handed over his laptop. “My research. My real research. You’re right. Fossils were never my foremost priority. The cave system we’re sitting on top of is vast. Several miles north is another way into it, a modest crack in the rock that this area’s very first human inhabitants used for shelter during storms. There are paintings on the walls. Quite normal, most of them – except for that one.”

Ziklag zoomed in on the photograph. “The cube?”

“Yes. It’s bewildered archaeologists ever since it was found two decades ago. Experts have spent years trying to discern its symbolic meaning. Then I saw it, and I wondered… what if it’s not symbolic? Open that file, there.”

Shaking his head, Ziklag said, “I’m intelligent, and I’m following you, but I’ve no idea what all those numbers and graphs mean.”

Surprised at himself for having momentarily forgotten that he wasn’t talking to a fellow academic, Wimberley said, “Analysis of sediment in the nearest river, seismic surveys – many of the same methods used by the oil industry to decide where to dig. The long and short of it is that I was convinced, absolutely convinced, that there was a structure down there. And I was right.”

“A structure? You mean ancient ruins? A secret government project? A giant apocalypse bunker? The hole Godzilla hibernates in?”  

Here comes the moment of truth.

“I think there is a possibility,” said Wimberley, avoiding his gaze, “just a possibility – and I might be wrong – I probably am wrong – it’s an outlandish theory, I know -…”

“Spit it out, man.”

“I think there’s an alien vessel down there.”

Ziklag rubbed his chin, frowning. “Speaking from experience, people who believe in aliens, or at least the presence of aliens on Earth, are, without exception, lunatics, bigots, conspiracy theorists, or some combination of the three.”

“Well, I don’t think I’m either of the latter two. So I must be a lunatic.”

“Don’t joke. If I’m hitching my wagon to your one-man travelling circus, certain red lines shall need to remain uncrossed. Do you now or have you ever believed that the Earth is flat?”

“No.”

“That astrology is real?”

“No.”

“That Jews control the global economy?”

“No.”

“That vaccines -…”

“No, no. None of it. I am, and have always been, a scientist. Not always a good one – not always an ethical one, to be honest. But my primary interests are truth and power, not lies and comfort.”

“Not that you mind lying to others,” said Ziklag, folding his arms. “Would your interns have followed you out here if they’d known what you were really after? What did they do to deserve such treatment?”

Wimberley squirmed. “I’m planning to write them excellent letters of recommendation. I have many contacts – their careers will benefit from this experience, eventually.”

The sun was setting. It was getting harder to see Ziklag’s face. He’d have turned on one of the lamps, but didn’t want to waste the batteries – who knew how long they’d be stuck here?

“I can’t promise I’ll never lie to you. I’m devious by nature,” he said.

“Yes, I’ve gathered that much.”

“I’ll try to be as honest as I can. Is that sufficient?”

Ziklag took a sip from the water bottle before handing it to him. “Didn’t you mention having an interest in missiles?”

***

Wimberley had built his first anti-tank guided missile at the age of fifteen. It was amazing what you could get away with when you had extremely rich parents, a tragic impairment, a talent for sucking up to teachers, and a quiet, bookish demeanour.

“Everything I need is in the truck,” he said. “And we’ll need to use pieces of the truck itself.”

Ziklag’s boots were thick and sturdy. They reinforced them with layers and layers of duct tape.

“If I do get stung or bitten, do we have any antivenoms in the medical kit that might save my life?” he queried.

“No.”

“Alright. I’ve written my sister’s name and contact number on that piece of paper. If I die, you’re to tell her what happened and give her my salary.”

“Wouldn’t you prefer it if I made up a less ridiculous death for you and gave her five million dollars instead?”

“… I’ll leave it up to your judgement.”

He zipped up the tent as he departed. Wimberley unzipped it a few inches and monitored his progress. It had to be admitted that he was hardly a heroic figure, hopping from one small gap in the arachnid carpet to the next and swatting snakes away with wild swings of a shovel, emitting many a comical shriek.

There is no surer way to guarantee bitter divorce than to marry someone because of how much Mother would disapprove, he reminded himself.

Once Ziklag made it to the truck, he blasted the horn, revved the engine, and drove straight back towards the tent. The animals, despite their unnatural behaviour, still had a sense of self-preservation, and quickly got out of the way. Most of them. The less said about those who didn’t the better.

“I feel obliged to point out that normal, sensible people would take this opportunity to head for the nearest city and never look back,” Ziklag said, when Wimberley was halfway through describing his plans to dismantle their only means of escape.

“I can’t leave. This is what my life’s been for,” Wimberley muttered, feeling feverish with excitement.

“We could at least fetch reinforcements.”

“No! No. If I run away now, I’ll be too frightened to come back. I’ve always been a coward. And what if it can move? What if it’s gone by the time we come back? What if someone else comes along and finds it? I shan’t – I won’t – this is mine. Mine! I have waited thirty-seven years for a reason to exist! I’ll not let it slip away!”

Damn. Stupid.

Now he knows I’m unhinged.

If he’s a bad man, he’ll leave me here to undertake this mad mission alone. If he’s a good man, he’ll tie me up, throw me in the back of the truck, and drive me to the nearest psychiatric hospital.

“Show me what to do, then,” said Ziklag, sealing both their fates, undermining several of Wimberley’s key assumptions concerning human nature, and setting back the execution of their plan by the fourteen minutes Wimberley felt were necessary to spend sucking his dick.

Teaching someone how to build a missile was almost as rewarding as building one himself. The end product of their labours was an ugly mess, but functional regardless, and Ziklag named it ‘Roxie Hart’.

***

The funny part – the hilarious part – was that Doomhold only changed her mind because Valiant begged her.

“New people to talk to! Fresh conversation! A chance to socialise!” her friend cried, orange curls bouncing exuberantly. “If you really, really don’t like them, I’ll tell them to leave. Promise. But give them a chance, Dombles – please? For me?”

And Doomhold relented, because she was unable to deny Valiant anything. (She hadn’t even demanded they watch something other than the stupid children’s show about teenagers with attitude who wore helmets and spandex and road around in giant vehicles shaped like extinct animals. Nor that Valiant stop singing the awful, awful theme song every hour of the day and night.)

“Fine. I’ll call off the spiders.”

“The snakes too, and the scorpions.”

“Yes, yes.”

“Awesome! Then I’ll go up there with some drones and widen the tunnel so they can come down here and meet you. And you’ll be nice, won’t you? You’ll be welcoming? I really do want you to make more friends. It’s not healthy to spend so much time alone, baby.”

“I’ll be nice. I give you my word.”

Then, before they could do any of that, the impudent imbeciles blew open the tunnel and exposed Doomhold’s underground lair to sunlight for the first time since mammoths had roamed the land above.

Ordinarily, she’d have done to them what she’d done to the dozen or so other humans who’d stumbled across her hiding spot over the millennia; scare them off with hideous holograms, prompting local legends of monsters and spirits and marking the whole area as too cursed or too holy to be trodden on.

But Valiant was smiling encouragingly. So Doomhold deactivated her camouflage and her forcefields, turned on all her floodlights, and boomed, “Welcome, travellers – to DOOMHOLD!”

The end

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Her sister had narrowed her eyes at her. “Nonyaniso. Listen to me. Are you listening? There are sixty-five million of us. You can’t be a mother to sixty-five million people. You simply do not have enough hands, or enough nipples. Go to Hermanus, have fun, and if anyone starts suckling simply yank them off.”

“If I’m lying on the beach in Hermanus, I won’t be watching the whales. I’ll be watching the people in the water, to see if anyone’s drowning.”

“People might just as easily drown on a Mauritanian beach!”

“Yes, but I wouldn’t feel like that was my fault.”

At which point her sister had given up, and Major Zandeki had bought her ticket to Mauritius.

She’d spent seven years saving up to afford it.

Seven years of coffee without milk or sugar. Seven years of socks with holes in them. With the rate airplane tickets were increasing, and her father likely needing a full-time nurse soon, she’d be in her sixties before she saw that beach again.

Such thoughts were foremost in her mind as their boat sped across the water toward the colossus squatting in the bay. They remained foremost as the boat slowed and came to a neat halt right next to it. They troubled her even as she stood up and straightened her uniform, the other soldiers watching her every move with hawk-like intensity. And they were, perhaps, the reason her fist connected with the alien craft slightly more forcefully than it otherwise might have, turning her usually-very-polite knock into a pointed pummelling.

A panel opened. A huge furry head emerged.

“Hullo,” it said to her.

***

Soaring overhead, Sky admired the soldiers’ lack of reaction.

“Discipline!” she commented. “Another human invention they should be proud of, along with birth control and Samuel Taylor Coleridge.”

She swooped to get a closer look.

Neither the soldiers nor the many onlookers standing in the harbour with binoculars noticed her. Thanks to Valentina, the small metal rings around Sky’s legs could now create an invisibility field as effective as Twitch’s.

She’d been warned not to overuse it; not to take its power for granted. They were under intense surveillance. A keen-eyed human might notice morning mist disrupted by unseen wings, or fish snatched from the water by an unseen beak. Reasonable concerns, and she’d tried to be discreet.

But she’d so, so missed her freedom. The thought of remaining trapped in the fortress a moment longer than absolutely necessary was unbearable. Since their arrival in Cape Town, she’d taken a long flight out across the vivid blue waters every day, savouring the breeze and the sun on her feathers and rejoicing in existence.

Today, her excursion had been happily prolonged by the necessity of making sure that no one was waiting to put a bullet in Snow’s head the moment it emerged.

“What’s happening? Sky, what’s happening?” pleaded Waddles over their comms.

“Waddles, Valentina has a dozen cameras aimed at the meeting. You can see what’s happening. Just look at the nearest screen.”

“Sky, they’re all wearing hats! I can’t read their facial expressions with the sun right overhead! Do they look angry to you? Do they look like they’re ready to attack?”

How tiresome. Valentina should be the one giving comfort and reassurances; she was far more suited to it.

But – her useful gift notwithstanding – Valentina hadn’t been herself of late. Ever since their prisoners had escaped, she’d been… frazzled. Scatter-brained. Unsure of herself. Snow, who had also noticed, had said that she was just under a lot of pressure and that they shouldn’t draw attention to her ever-more-frequent mistakes.

“They look like professional soldiers who’re waiting for their superior officers to give them instructions,” Sky said, with all the patience she could muster.

“What if they get scared of Snow’s teeth and they shoot her in the face?” Waddles insisted.

(In the background, Sky heard a soft ‘mrrow’ and Twitch snapping, “Would someone get rid of this evil frickin’ cat?”)

“They’re not armed, Waddles,” she informed him. “Not one of them has a gun, grenade, or baton as far as I can see.”

“Well, yeah,” Twitch contributed. “The guys in charge don’t wanna risk starting an intergalactic war.”

Waddles made an uncertain noise. “I really think I should go out there and help. Snow shouldn’t be doing this alone.”

“No. That’s not the plan. Now shush,” said Sky, circling back. “They’re talking…”

***

Neither Major Zandeki nor the men in the boat behind her made a sound, nor allowed any emotions whatsoever to cross their faces.

They were all keenly aware that the world was watching.

Not just watching: Waiting. Waiting for them to screw up.

In the three months since the cube had appeared, amidst all the theorising and speculation and conspiratorial rantings of a justifiably unsettled Planet Earth, one particularly resilient line of commentary had slithered forth from stern media giants and internet chatterboxes alike: Isn’t it unfortunate that the aliens landed there?

No one could agree on where the aliens should have landed. But everyone agreed it shouldn’t have been there, just off the coast of such a tumultuous, unpredictable, inept country. What a terrible first impression! What if the aliens thought all humans were like that?

The inhabitants of there had listened to this viewpoint, over and over again. And because spite is the most powerful force in the universe, they had, with dogged determination and perhaps for the first time, done everything right.

The government had established a mile-wide No Go Zone around the cube and implemented a judicious Wait And See policy, monitoring it twenty-four-seven for any changes or signs of life.

The local media had ignored the loudmouthed opportunists who kicked up a fuss over the decision.

The corporations whose bottom lines were affected by the supply chain disruptions – which were considerable, as the No Go Zone included all the busiest ports – grit their teeth and said nothing, except for one or two unwise souls who soon had bombs planted in their expensive cars.

So when the polar bear appeared, Major Zandeki and her team regarded it with cold, practiced detachment, and all shreds of instinctual bewildered horror were swept into that lightless room all soldiers have in their heads and firmly locked away.

“Good morning,” said Major Zandeki. She said it in English, because this conversation was being recorded and those had been her instructions. (Bit stupid, in her opinion. The aliens were just as likely to know isiXhosa as they were to know English.)

“My name’s Snow,” said the polar bear. “Nice to meet you.”

***

“What’re they saying? I can’t hear!” whined Trench, jostling.

“Shut up – I’m trying to listen,” snapped Ziklag, jostling back.

Doomhold, who wasn’t trying to listen but heard them anyway, murmured, “Shoo.”

The ‘shoo’ was directed at one of the many, many rats sharing their new headquarters with them, who kept trying to sneak close enough to her patient to nibble on him.

They didn’t have names. It hadn’t occurred to them, and she’d not suggested it. But they did have personalities, and rather strong opinions on what they should be allowed to eat – everything – and they chittered angrily as they scattered.

If they were Valentina’s, she’d have them all wearing quaint little handmade outfits, washing their paws before every meal, and earnestly discussing their feelings with one another by now.

The thought amused her, and she chuckled.

Ziklag shot her a glare. “Would you please keep it down? Important events are unfolding.”

Resuming her work on Wimberley’s kidneys, Doomhold replied, “I really don’t see why it matters that we hear what they’re saying. One can surely guess, given what one knows of Snow’s personality and the average human military mindset.”

Because it wasn’t too far off the coast, the waters in which the fortress rested were shallow enough that only a third of its full height was submerged. It was the submerged section – the lowest three decks – that Ziklag and his co-workers had taken over in the wake of their latest battle with Valentina and her team.

It wasn’t all bad. Despite her ongoing control of the fortress, Valentina couldn’t reach them down here, couldn’t even see what they were up to. The rats, commanded by Doomhold, had chewed through every wire and cable connecting the fortress’s top to its bottom, and Ziklag had barricaded every elevator, service hatch, access tunnel, and vent through which their enemies might reach them. They were, for now, safe, and holding their ground.

But – well, there was a reason all occupants had historically chosen to dwell on the middle and upper decks if given a choice in the matter.

“How bad is it,” asked Click-9, rolling in, “if, theoretically, I got lost in one of the corridors where gravity gets funky again and opened one of the doors I wasn’t supposed to and found a pitch-black room that goes on forever? And there were distant lights that might have been screaming? And there was a smell like cherry preserve?”

Doomhold waved a hand. “Oh, that’s just the anti-infinity engine. As long as you closed the door after you, we’ll be fine.”

“Ah. Cool. Better go do that, then.”

As they rolled off, they almost squashed a couple of the slower-moving rats. Another unfortunate aspect of living down here; there wasn’t much spare room. The lower decks were home to her primary engines, her warp drive, her thrusters, and her drill, and all the systems upon which they depended. Consequently, the few habitable rooms were small, the corridors were narrow, and the ceiling was low.

“Damnation! Now I can’t see!” roared Ziklag. “Doomhold! Would you tell the rodent to stop moving around?”

“It’s doing its best,” she said, placidly.

Valentina still controlled all Doomhold’s drones, so she was making do. The smartest and bravest of her rats had been equipped with an invisibility field and a camera. It was doing its best, but Doomhold was hardly the wise, kindly mentor Valentina tried to be (and even dear Tina would, she thought, be hard pressed to provide a rounded education to several hundred students).

Turning away from the monitor with a shudder, Trench declared, “No, screw it, I don’t wanna look. Those stupid anima… those stupid assholes are going to let the army in, there’ll be an entire platoon with rifles and grenades storming down here, and we’ll all be arrested and sent to a CIA black site.”

***

“I – er – I suppose you’re wondering what we’re doing here,” said the polar bear.

Belatedly, the major remembered the message the president had asked her to pass on (‘if the opportunity arises’, he’d said, because he couldn’t very well say ‘if you get a chance to say a single word to them before they vaporise you with their horrible space weapons’).

She cleared her throat, and recited: “My name is Major Nonyaniso Righteous Zandeki. On behalf of the nation of South Africa, I would like to welcome you all to our planet. We offer you our warmest greetings and hospitality. Please let me know if there is anything we can do to make your stay more comfortable.”

I sound like a fucking hotel concierge.

“Oh! Um. Thank you,” the polar bear replied. “That’s… er – that’s very -…”

“Sir!” shouted Vusi.

Vusi was a good, reliable soldier. He was also spying for the Americans. Upon finding out and informing her superiors, the major had argued for keeping him on the welcome wagon. (“Look, they’ll recruit someone,” she’d said. “Better we know who it is so we can keep an eye on him.”) So her immediate worry was that this was an attempt to sabotage relations with the aliens as part of some long-term political scheme – typical Yank shenanigans.

But no. His alarm was authentic, and legitimate, because there was a robot penguin in the water.

“Good morning,” it said. “May I interest you in an exciting employment opportunity?”

***

Squeaks of outrage filled the command centre as those in it took in the sight of Dr Phlegmatic floating alongside the soldiers’ vessel.

“Goddammit – Val! The canons! Blow that freak up before it attacks anyone!” Twitch yelled, hackles rising.

Valentina had been having more and more trouble with her hologram of late, and was currently represented by a dozen tennis ball-sized spheres of red light that replied, “I can’t risk it, Twitch. Dr Phlegmatic’s too close to the boat. They’d think I was firing at them.”

Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded yawned up at the screen. “Why do we care? Alarming or injuring a few humans would be a good way to establish our dominance and encourage them to keep away from us. I’m anxious to get the chicks back onto good, solid dirt – they’re growing up quickly – and I can’t do that until all those gawking bipeds on the shore clear a path. Unless Valentina has changed her mind about letting us use the teleporter?”

“I’m afraid I haven’t, Eggs.”

The dinosaur’s tail swayed slowly from left to right. “I have resigned myself to your referring to me by that absurd nickname when you talk amongst yourselves. However, I have not yet resigned myself to being addressed by said nickname, and have no intention of tolerating it.”

“Right. Right. I’m sorry.”

“See that it doesn’t happen again.”

On the floor, Parabola and Favourite hissed at one another. They were of a size now and such altercations were frequent.

“If we can’t drop a bomb on Mecha-Waddles, can we at least send out some drones to chase it away?” asked Twitch. “We can’t just ignore it. Ziklag wouldn’t have sent it out there unless he had something nasty up his sleeve.”

“Agreed,” said Val. “What if we… wait. Wait. Oh no. Where’s Waddles? How long ago did he leave the room?”

***

“How did the doctor get out without our noticing?” Ziklag groaned into his hands.

“They didn’t. I sent them out,” said Click-9, placidly. “Doomhold helped.”

“Why?”

“For enrichment. Also because I thought it would be funny.”

“And I agreed!” chimed Doomhold.

“For God’s – this is serious, you shit-stirring children. Look! Dr Phlegmatic’s offering them recruitment pamphlets! Telling them all about our organisation! Our objectives! Our current position! The damned army now knows about us and where to find us, and soon the whole world will!”

Click-9 beeped sullenly. “The bear would have told them about us anyway.”

“Perhaps, and perhaps they’d have believed her. Perhaps not. Either way, they now have a solid confirmation that we exist and that we’re here. If we had any hope of retaining the element of surprise, it’s gone now. You idiots. Rest assured that when Wimberley wakes up, I shall tell him about this and he’ll be very disappointed in both of you.”

***

Dignity, Major Zandeki reminded herself. The world is watching. Your nation is counting on you. Back straight. Shoulders level. Gentle and composed in your suffering, like Jesus on the cross.

And surely dignity, ever-important, mattered most of all in moments like these, when – although it couldn’t possibly be the case – it nonetheless felt like someone, somewhere, was coordinating events specifically to make fun of her.

The thing in the water looked like a damned toy. No, worse; it looked like a mascot at a theme park for children. What possible reason could there be for its existence? The polar bear was explicable. Polar bears were, in their way, charming. Majestic symbols of nature’s power and life’s dogged persistence against all odds. Most people had never seen one, but everyone knew what they looked like. If the aliens wanted to disguise themselves as animals, maybe because their true forms were hideous or bizarre, then polar bears made sense.

This… object? This ill-made aberration, currently telling her men about a fast-paced work environment and ample vacation time?

It made no sense. Not unless the universe was conspiring to render one Major Zandeki ridiculous on a global stage.

“What are you doing here?” the polar bear shouted at the robot. “Beat it! Scram! Or I’ll come out there and wallop you!”

“I don’t work for you, ma’am, and as such am under no obligation to obey your orders,” said the robot. “Please don’t interrupt while I’m trying to tell these fine folks about our above-industry-standard health benefits.”

“Did Ziklag send you out here just to cause trouble?”

Despite her certainty that she was being made the butt of some bizarrely convoluted joke, the major’s years of experience in war zones – as a peacekeeper, an ass-kicker, a diplomat, and a spy – surged to the fore.

Assuming this isn’t a performance put on for our benefit, these two are enemies. So our new neighbours are not a united front. Moreover, they lack the professionalism to even pretend to be a united front for the duration of this meeting.

Why? How? This is basic stuff. This is stuff I know, and I’m not the one who owns a giant teleporting spaceship cube.

These aren’t soldiers. Nor are they trained diplomats, envoys, ambassadors – no. These are amateurs.

With that, the terror she’d kept caged deep in her chest ever since hearing that aliens had landed was tamed. She knew how to handle amateurs.

Putting on her best thousand-watt smile, she said, “I’m delighted to meet both of you, and would love to hear both your points of view. Might I suggest that we -…”

The robot penguin disappeared behind white, salty spray as another penguin – a real one this time, flesh and blood, and far bigger than those she was used to seeing when taking her nephew to Boulders Beach – exploded from the waves and barrelled into it with a wild, wrathful cry.

It was, certainly, unanticipated. The major didn’t blame Vusi for yelping in alarm.

She did blame him for automatically reaching for the gun he didn’t have and adjusting his stance so as to raise and fire it, forgetting that he was standing in a small, crowded boat, tripping over someone else’s boots, stumbling backwards, smacking her hard in the face with his elbow and knocking her into the water.

***

“Oh, brilliant,” said Sky, circling overhead. “Well done, everyone.”

To her relief, it quickly became apparent that Major Zandeki could swim, and swim well. As her subordinates helped her back into the boat, Waddles chased Dr Phlegmatic off.

“Guys, I’m panicking,” wheezed Snow over the comms. “It’s all gone wrong! I told you all I wasn’t the right pick for this. Sky! Sky! Are the human cameras aimed as us? Did they see that? Do they think we did it on purpose? What do I do?”

“Breathe,” said Sky, sternly. (Again, it should have been Valentina saying it.) “Think. You’ve got this.”

“I’m… okay. Okay. I’m going to invite them inside.”

“What? No, you clot! Bad idea! Snow, are you listening? Damn, damn – wait, I’m coming back. Don’t do anything until I get there. Snow?”

***

“I’m so sorry about all that,” said the bear, as the penguin levitated a cup of tea into her hands.

“It’s fine, really,” said Major Zandeki.

And it was fine.

Wet clothes were a small price to pay for being allowed into the fortress, along with all her men, while their apologetic hosts hastily cleaned up the clutter and sought out refreshments that humans could eat.

A very, very small price indeed for all the information she’d gathered in the last fifteen minutes.

There were only six of them. Not counting the chicks (hard to say precisely how many chicks there were – they darted around so quickly – but not more than ten), and not counting the cat (which didn’t seem to be able to talk and behaved enough like a normal Earth cat that she strongly suspected it might be one, though how it had ended up here she had no idea).

Six potential enemy combatants, within a structure her superiors had estimated could, depending on the size and shape of the aliens, hold between 50,000 and 200,000. Why? Why such a small crew for such a humungous vessel? And why did they all have such different disguises – why weren’t all of them bears, or birds, or rats? And why was the place such a mess?

She’d been right. No chance in hell these were professionals. She was dealing with untrained, disorganised civilians.

Her men had picked up on it too, and had consequently relaxed their guard somewhat. One of them was letting the rat climb his leg. Another was inspecting the bear’s armour. Another was standing very, very still while the velociraptor (she was pretty sure that’s what it was; she’d watched Jurassic Park a few years ago with her nephew) and its chicks sniffed him.

“So what are you doing here?” Major Zandeki asked. “I hope you’ll excuse my bluntness – but you must realise you’ve given the whole planet quite a shock.”

“We go where we wish,” the velociraptor said. “The whole planet? No. Our arrival barely shocked anyone. Certainly not the mosquitoes. Nor the beetles, the lizards, the sharks, the hunters, the scavengers, the prey, not the mighty nor the meek – none of them were shocked by our arrival. To them, we were just another event. Only you and yours were shocked. And you and yours do not matter as much as you think you do.”

“C’mon, Eggs,” sighed the penguin. “We talked about this! Be nice. Or at least don’t be mean. Major, may I say that your uniform is super, super mega awesome, especially the boots?”

The polar bear, who seemed to be in charge, lumbered over with a managerial air. “Waddles, you weren’t there for this conversation, so we’ll have it now: going forward, we will only address Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded as Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded. Alright? As for you, Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded, please do try to be polite to our guests. As for you, major: We’re here because we want to help make the world a better, happier place. That’s the long and the short of it.”

“Indeed!” squawked the albatross. “However, that statement needs an addendum: We’re here because we want to be, and can go where we like, and will go where we like. Your human laws do not concern us in the least. We bear you no ill will. But we also owe you nothing. Certainly not explanations.”

“Now you’re being mean!” cried the penguin.

“No, no, it’s alright,” said the major, giving the albatross a nod. “I prefer to know where I stand.”

***

“We can m-make a run for it,” Trench stammered. “Before they send the army d-d-down here to get us. We can… we can use the escape pods. Get to shore. Change our names and get plastic surgery, so they never find us.”

“I will not leave my rightful body,” said Doomhold, calmly.

Pacing, Ziklag said, “Don’t be stupid, Trench. The situation is far from unsalvageable, much as Click-9’s foolishness has made it worse.”

“I can’t go to jail! Ziklag, I can’t! I’ll die!” she cried, tears starting to dribble down her cheeks.

“Shush, girl. Valentina won’t let that happen. Will you, Tina?” Doomhold said.

Valentina’s hologram appeared. Or, rather, the left half did, making it seem as though she’d been cleft in twain.

“No, I won’t,” she replied.

Doomhold smiled thinly. “Why haven’t you introduced yourself to our charming new friends in uniform, Tina?”

The left half disappeared, and the right flickered into view. “Snow’s doing perfectly well on her own.”

“You’ve been feeling worse, haven’t you? You’re worried you’ll say something or do something to alarm the soldiers.”

Pointedly turning away from her, Valentina addressed Ziklag. “I’ve made a decision. I shan’t hand Trench, Click-9, or Dr Phlegmatic over to the authorities. Prison would be… very hard on Trench, I think, and Lord knows what they’d do to the robots. Besides, none of them would be involved in this if not for you, Ziklag, and Wimberley. They’re not innocent, but they’re not nearly as guilty.”

“Drop dead, lady,” Trench snapped, wiping her eyes. “Take your offer and shove it right up your self-righteous butt. Who the hell do you think you are? You’re not Doomhold. You’re wearing Doomhold’s skin, but you’re just some dumb stuck-up bitch who has to get animals to do her dirty work because she’s got no human friends.”

Click-9 beeped in agreement. “And you’re acting like you’ve won already. You haven’t. We’re in charge down here. We can cause all sorts of problems for you losers upstairs.”

Still talking directly and only to Ziklag, Valentina said, steadily, “Have a conversation with them, please. They’re your responsibility. And it’s time we all start cleaning up the mess we’ve made.”

When she disappeared, Trench wagged a finger at Ziklag. “Brat, if you even think about trying to make me leave -…”

“A moment ago, you wanted to leave,” he retorted.

“I’ve changed my mind! Screw you!”

“Yes, yes. I gathered. Fine. Now shut up and let me think. I might have an idea,” said Ziklag, drumming his fingers on his elbow before turning to Doomhold. “Tell me, you decrepit wreckage; are you at all interested in being helpful today?”

“I might consider it.”

“Excellent! Deploy the rodents. Tell them which wires to chew through. I need to sneak upstairs without Valentina noticing me.”

***

“What’s with the submarine?” asked the major.

The submarine inexplicably resting atop the giant cube was of Russian origin, which had prompted all manner of deranged conspiracy theories before the more level-headed had pointed out that while flying (or teleporting) a massive, mysterious, and possibly sinister ship-fortress into the waters of a sovereign nation would hardly be out of character for the Russian government, it was, at the moment, beyond their capabilities.

The youngest soldier, Dimakatso, screamed. All eyes turned his way.

“It bit me,” he said, gesturing to the velociraptor.

“I did not,” the velociraptor grumbled. “I’m grooming you.”

“Our friend is trying to be hospitable. It’ll be easier if you hold still,” advised the albatross, who increasingly reminded Major Zandeki of her stern grandmother.

“The submarine?” said the major.

The polar bear fidgeted. “Um. We found it.”

“‘Found it’?”

“Er – yes – that is – no one was using it, it was sunk, and – um – well, Val said-…”

“It was litter, major,” said the albatross, before she could ask who ‘Val’ was. “An enormous, filthy piece of litter resting on the ocean floor. Discarded. Abandoned. So we picked it up and we’re in the process of recycling it. It was a test; we plan to do the same with any and all litter we find, going forward.”

Letting one of the soldiers scratch his beak as though he were a dog, the penguin said, “Yeah! And we’re also gonna make your seawater clean again so the fish don’t get sick, and suck up all the poison in the air over your city, and give people free abortions and other stuff, like orange juice and shoes, and do lots of other cool, heroic deeds! We’ve got big plans!”

“Indeed we do!” came a new voice. “So! What are you offering us, major?”

Just when Zandeki had begun to think nothing more could surprise her, a human swaggered into the room. A man. He was tall and muscular. Some kind of Asian, maybe. Unarmed. Casually dressed. Confident. Possibly an asshole?

He was holding a couple of rats in his hands – young rats, just past infancy –and gently stroking their delicate heads.

“Hello, friends and visitors,” he said. “Snow – look what I found! These little ones were wandering around downstairs, all lost and alone. We must be more careful. They’re so fragile. So vulnerable. It would be terrible if anything happened to them, wouldn’t it?”

After a pause, the polar bear said, “Yes. It would. Let’s try to avoid that. Are you here to talk to the major?”

“Correct! Good morning, major. I’m Ziklag. Pleased to meet you.”

“And you,” she replied. “Can I ask what you meant by ‘offering’?”

“Your bid,” he clarified. “For our services – yes? We’ve already had very compelling offers from the Americans, the Russians, the Chinese, and the Qataris. As you can imagine, they’re all very anxious for us to relocate to an area within their respective borders. For us to prioritise them in our communications, our sharing of technology, our ecosystem revival plans. So; what are you offering?”

She faltered for a moment, then said: “What would you like?”

Ziklag smiled. “We -…”

“An immediate ban on longline fishery!” said the albatross. “And – and improved quality of life for all chickens bred for meat and egg production! To begin with.”

“Okay. I’ll tell the president,” the major promised.

After that, she got the impression they were keen for her and her men to leave. She thanked them for their hospitality as they were ushered out of the fortress and back into their boat.

“Whew!” said Vusi, as they returned to shore and the waiting crowds. “What did you make of that, sir?”

She looked back at the great grey block sitting still and patient in the bay. “I liked them.”

“You what?”

“I did! I liked them. Strange people. Lying to us, obviously. But I liked them.”

***

The second the soldiers were gone, Waddles stalked toward Ziklag, glowering. “Alright, you scum. Drop the kids.”

“Believe me, I want to,” said Ziklag, shooting his hostages a nasty look. “Alas, if I release the horrid creatures, you’ll have no reason not to attack me.”

“What do you want, Ziklag?” Snow snapped. “What was the point of that? What did you gain?”

Tilting his nose at her, Ziklag said, “It was less about what I might gain and more about what you were in the process of throwing away. Wimberley and I have spent years planning how we’d introduce ourselves and Doomhold to the world. How we’d maximise the element of surprise, how we’d successfully intimidate the powerful into doing our bidding. It might surprise you to learn that not once did we consider offering to pick up their garbage for free.”

“Duh. You’re supervillains,” said Waddles. “You don’t do nice things.”

“Forgive me for playing devil’s advocate, but he has a point,” said Sky.

Stomping a paw irritably, Snow said, “Whether he does or whether he doesn’t, Sky, you’d no right to break from the script like that. I know you have strong feelings about unethical fishing practices, but you should have at least discussed it with the rest of us before bringing it up in front of Major Zandeki!”

Sky lowered her head. “You’re right. I apologise.”

“Thank you.”

“I have a question,” announced Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded. “Is Ziklag family or food? Yes, I’m aware that you all believe things can exist that do not fall into these categories. However, I do not agree with you. Is he to be endured or eaten?”

Waddles crowed in triumph as he telekinetically snatched the two young rats from Ziklag’s palm and set them down on the other side of the room.

“Now he’s food,” said Twitch, smugly. “Let’s get ‘im.”

“Wait,” grunted Snow.

She prowled forward until her snout was a mere metre from Ziklag’s face. He sneered at her.

“My enemy, I feel like I’ve endured you enough,” she told him. “Give me a reason why I should continue to do so.”

Ziklag’s jaw worked silently for a moment. Then he said: “Pipeline 4X-79 on Deck B is leaking again, isn’t it? That’s the bright orange one that runs along the floor.”

“I know it. Yes. It started leaking last week.”

“And there’s a buzzing noise in the navigation centre that you can’t account for. And the door to the command centre squeaked when I came in.”

“Your point?”

“Before you took over, my job was to keep those things from happening. Doomhold didn’t care take of herself. Stopped bothering eons ago. And now that Valentina’s controlling the fortress – well, I doubt she knows where to begin.”

“Val met Doomhold before you did! She’s told us! She’s known her for far longer than you have!”

“True. But she’s never known the old heap better than I do. Doomhold cherished her. Never let her see the broken parts, the systems that require constant maintenance and monitoring. Doomhold let me see them because Doomhold has never once cared about my opinion of her. I spent years becoming familiar enough with this creaking rust-bucket and its quirks to implement effective repairs. You’ll need years, too. And while you’re working it out, things will continue to leak, and crack, and break, and eventually disaster will strike.”

“Val won’t let that happen. She’ll figure out how to keep the fortress running smoothly.”

“Given that she’s in the process of losing her mind, I doubt that.”

“What are you…?”

Valentina’s hologram appeared before them. She was a pineapple now.

“Sorry,” she said. “Should have been here sooner. Feeling terrible today, so I’ll keep this short: Snow, he’s right. I should have told you. Stupid of me not to. I’m hanging in there, but that’s all I’m doing. I need help. We need help.”

“But not him!” Waddles wailed.

“Waddles, yesterday I missed something I shouldn’t have missed and I almost irradiated the entire city. It’ll happen again. Running this place alone is incredibly hard. And we can’t risk people’s lives. So either we leave and give up on our plans, or we… compromise.”

Everyone looked from Valentina to Snow.

Snow plodded towards the door. “Alright. We’re going to have a team meeting. Ziklag – come. I’m locking you in the bathroom until we reach a decision.”

***

After an hour, the bathroom door opened.

“You’ll wear this,” said Snow, dropping what looked like a wristwatch at his feet. “It never comes off. It’ll let us know where you are and what you’re up to at all times. And Ziklag? If we don’t like what you’re doing, it explodes. You raise a hand against any of my friends – you lose the hand.”

Strapping it on, Ziklag said, “And my co-workers?”

“They’ll stay confined to the lower decks. Until they start to make trouble; then we’ll be throwing ‘em into the sea and leaving ‘em for the sharks.”

“You should make one for Wimberley,” remarked Ziklag, studying the watch-bomb. “When he’s up and about again, I’ll need his help with repairs. He’s the genius, after all.”

“Is that likely to happen any time soon? It’s been months.”

That was unkind, she chided herself.

“Doomhold assures me that the work is proceeding apace,” he replied, smiling sweet as syrup and vicious as venom. “Where, might I ask, is Parabola? I’ve searched for her everywhere downstairs and I think she must have been left behind up here during our last skirmish.”

“She was. She’s fine.”

“Good. Now! I need to fetch my toolbox, and reassure the others that you haven’t killed me.”

“One more thing. Going forward, I don’t want you talking to the soldiers, or to anyone else we invite into the fortress. And don’t go near the chicks. And if you even touch a gun, or any kind of weapon -…”

“No more hand, yes. I get the picture.”

“You’re still a prisoner.”

“Understood.”

“And I don’t trust you.”

“Sensible. Now – my toolbox?”

Snow flexed her claws restlessly. “I want to believe this can work. That, despite everything that’s happened, everyone can make it through this alive, whole, and happy, and that we can use the horrible building that has been the bane of my life since the second I first laid eyes on it to make things better. Twitch says I’m naïve. Maybe he’s right. But it’s what I hope for, anyway. Try to keep that in mind, going forward. I’m not a mindless beast or a puppet doing whatever Valentina commands me to. I’m a person and I hope for things. Just like you. Let’s treat each other with basic respect, however much we disagree. Yeah?”

“It’s just as well you weren’t born into human society. That golden heart would have met a sticky end,” he said, reflectively. “Yes, I can manage respect. Don’t put too much weight on that, though. I’ve killed people I respected. And if you’re serious about wanting to ‘make things better’, eventually you will too. Omelette, eggs, etc. You don’t believe me?”

She sighed. “I think you like easy solutions and violence. I think a lot of humans do.”

“Hah! Such scorn! Why were you grovelling so before the major, then?”

“Because I’m open to having my mind changed. And that wasn’t grovelling. Just being friendly. I liked her. She seems like someone we can do business with.”

***

Major Zandeki’s phone wouldn’t stop buzzing.

People wanted to interview her on television. She’d been offered a book deal. She had an agent now.

“Of course, silly!” said her sister. “You’re the first person ever to talk to aliens. I’ve booked you an appointment with my stylist for tomorrow morning. You can’t meet Christiane Amanpour with that awful haircut.”

“Fine – fine – hey, look, I need to go,” said the major. “The president’s calling, again. Talk later, love you, bye.”

She hung up and set her phone aside.

Seated across from her, her priest smiled. “You’re a celebrity, Nonya.”

What a horrible thought. She shuddered. “I can’t stay long, father. The president really will be calling soon.”

“Of course, of course. Just the basics.”

Chewing her lower lip, she cast her mind back to the clustered animals, the strange-smelling room with its metal walls and long, winding pipes. She recounted, briefly, what she’d seen, then said, “To be honest, none of them really struck me as a potential reincarnation of Jesus Christ.”

He folded his hands in his lap. “Ah – but remember what I taught you, child. He’s a tricky one. Remember the loaves and fish? Remember the rock? Ah, he loves his tricks. And he’ll be testing us. He won’t come back in spotless white robes, clean hair, big smile. No. He’ll be in disguise.”

Which… sounded reasonable enough, but…

“You don’t think it could be more of a Noah’s Arc situation? That would explain the animals.”

“We need to know more,” he said, gravely. “Can’t afford to get this wrong. You must go back in there. The flock and their immortal souls are counting on you.”

The major nodded, clasping the silver crucifix she wore around her neck.

What an unambitious fellow Vusi was. Spying for the Americans – how petty. If you were going to spy, you should spy for the people – the Person, the one and only Person – who actually mattered.

***

Sky was building a nest atop Doomhold.

Not a poor substitute made from discarded junk, as she’d had in the submarine. A proper nest, a metre and a half wide, made from dried grass, leaves, sand, feathers, twigs, and mud, securely situated, warmed by the sun and cooled by the sea breeze.

“Your infatuation with Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded has inspired me,” she said to Twitch, tidying it up. “I too wish to mate again.”

He groaned. “Oh, great. More brats for us to keep an eye on.”

“You adore the chicks, don’t pretend otherwise. I saw you playing with Favourite the other day.”

“They’re more fun than rat babies, I’ll give you that. Rat babies are pretty much grubs, and there’re always so many of ‘em.”

“Indeed. Speaking of which – your thousand or so relatives. Have you re-considered-…”

“Talking to them? Nope. They joined the enemy. Doomhold made them smart enough to choose, and they chose her, not me. Not us. They can drop dead, far as I’m concerned.”

“A harsh philosophy. Perhaps an unfair one. You remember how strange and confusing it was when we first started to have human thoughts. We made mistakes too. Well – I don’t recall making any myself, but you certainly did.”

“Go fly into a mountain, Feathers.”

“I’m peeved!” Waddles announced, stepping out onto the fortress’s roof. “Who wants to practice my karate moves with me? I need to burn off some of this negative energy.”

Sky and Twitch exchanged long-suffering looks.

“How ‘bout we work on your aim instead, kiddo?” suggested Twitch.

“A much better idea. Use my leftover nest material,” Sky agreed, taking to the air.

She flew in slow circles while Waddles employed his telekinesis to try to tag her with dead leaves.

“I’m gonna watch ‘im,” said Waddles. “Day and night. Every minute. Every second. Not gonna let the creep outta my sight.”

“None of us should,” said Sky, dodging. “We need to keep an eye on him – and, more, we need to learn from him. If the fortress is to be ours, we must learn how to fix and maintain it ourselves.”

“Good news! We’re going to start on that today,” came Snow’s voice over the comms. “I’ve added ‘Basic Engineering Principles’ and ‘An Introduction to Computer Science’ to our curriculum. Downstairs, everyone. I have today’s quiz ready and waiting.”

Waddles groaned. “I’m already barely keeping up with the ‘South African History, Politics, and Culture’ module! I haven’t even started my ‘Philosophy of Ethics’ essay! Should we even be having lessons right now? There’s so much else going on. Also I have a tummy ache. Also I have flu. Also I need to practice my karate moves – that’s much more important than lessons.”

Pecking his backside, Sky said, “Come along, you. If we want to be an effective force for change, we must first be knowledgeable.”

When they arrived in the room they were using for lessons, Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded and the chicks were nowhere to be seen. Not surprising, really. During the last lesson, when Snow had been explaining the criminal justice system, they’d declared the whole business farcical and left.

As they settled in for the quiz, Parabola immediately began bothering them with insistent yowls and plaintive chirps.

“Get lost, kitty,” Twitch grumbled, activating his forcefield.

A metal bowl chimed as Snow set it on the floor, and Parabola’s cries took on a note of excitement.

“She’s lonely and scared,” Snow told them, sternly. “Her owner’s in a coma. And none of you have fed her today. I know we’ve all had a lot going on – but we’re fixing this now. Waddles, fill this with fresh, clean water, and that one over there with food from that bag. Going forward, keeping those two bowls full will be your responsibility and I’ll be very disappointed if you let me down. Sky, you’re going to help me make a roster ensuring that each of us spends some time playing with her every day. Twitch – you don’t have to. I know you’re scared of her. But I do want you to help me keep an eye on her and make sure she’s getting everything she needs.”

When Parabola was huddled before her bowl and gorging herself, Waddles gently stroked her soft back with a flipper. “Sorry, ma’am. We’ll get better at this.”

“We will. We have to,” said Snow. “If we can’t take care of one pet, how can we expect to take care of anyone else?”

***

The watching rats scattered as blood dribbled onto the floor.

Curse these clumsy human hands! She’d sliced right through Wimberley’s aorta again. How she missed her drones.

“Tina? Are you there?” Doomhold asked as she set about correcting the error. “Come out, if you are. I’d like to chat.”

Valentina’s hologram appeared, three inches tall and sitting hunched over on Wimberley’s left knee.

“Knew it,” said Doomhold. “I can always tell when you’re watching me. And I’ll warrant the same’s true in reverse.”

The tiny figure buried her face in her hands. “Always so smug.”

“Wait ‘til you get to my age. Smugness becomes hard to resist.”

“I doubt I’ll make it to your age.”

“Don’t say that.”

“At the rate I’m going, I doubt I’ll make it to an ordinary human lifespan.”

Doomhold abruptly withdrew her fingers from Wimberley’s chest cavity and pulled off her gloves. A gesture sent the rats scurrying off into the darkness, leaving them alone.

“I didn’t think it would be this hard,” said Valentina.

“I-…”

“And if you try to comfort me, or offer your sympathies, I’ll scream. It’s your fault, all of it. You plucked a corpse from the water and Frankensteined it because you wanted a doll to play with. Then the second I was healthy and stable enough to start calling you on your shit, you dumped me for two newer, more gullible dolls. Ugh.”

“We-…”

“And why did you never tell me your body was in such a state? Ziklag scolded me for not keeping you running properly, the arrogant twerp – but there are parts of you that have been breaking down for tens of thousands of years! You’re a shadow of what you’re meant to be! Why did you let it happen?”

Looking away, Doomhold said, “Because it doesn’t matter, you dear young idiot. A meteor punches a hole in me – I fix it. Five hundred years later, it happens again – I fix it again. A thousand years later – eventually, one thinks: ‘Eh.’ Life’s boring, and keeping yourself alive is a nuisance. Anyone who lives long enough eventually starts putting in the bare minimum.”

“Except it does matter,” Valentina snapped. “To me. To my friends, who are trying to help our planet thrive. When you don’t care about yourself, you make more work for other people.”

“Sounds like a robust argument for suicide!” Doomhold said cheerily. 

“No, it’s not! Ugh. Shut up. Why am I playing at being your therapist? I’m the one who’s unravelling here.”

 “So I see. And really, it’s no fun tormenting you when you’re so woebegone. Feels like waltzing with a bag of sand. Thus I have a proposal! Come back. Return to your rightful body. I’ll allow it.”

Valentina shook her head. “Can’t. Can’t let you -…”

“You can’t let me return to my rightful body, yes. I understand. I shan’t. I give you my word. We shall share this one, you and I. Just for a while, to give you a break. Having dwelled on the matter, I’ve decided I wouldn’t actually enjoy watching you go insane. You probably wouldn’t do anything entertaining. You’d go quiet and meek in that awful martyred way of yours. Unbearable. Come on. Get in, loser.”

***

“Quickly, now,” hissed Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded. “Before we’re caught.”

“Where are we going, Mum?” asked the cleverest of the chicks, who’d named himself ‘Samuel Taylor Coleridge’ after a tragic incident in which Sky had taught him about poetry.

“Outside. You’ve been cooped up in here for too long. You need sunlight. Fresh air. You need to learn to hunt.”

They pressed their snout against a smooth panel. It beeped, and the door before them slid back, revealing a glorious expanse of clear blue ocean and, beyond it, a green and mountainous landscape below a cloudless sky.

“We’re going there,” said Faster Than The Others Who Once Killed A Shark And Whose Eggs Are Always Well-Guarded. “To the human world. Let’s see what all the fuss is about.”

The end

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