Mort(e) and Wawa pulled themselves onto the deck of the Vesuvius, a small balcony where two humans helped them to their feet. Mort(e) could not discern their gender because both were dressed in the same bug-like outfits that the first one wore, the one who had sacrificed himself. From here, Mort(e) could get a better look at the ship. The three main balloons supporting the cabin were coated in a shimmering silver material that reflected the ground, the sky, and the sun all at once. It could mimic the colors around it like the skin of a chameleon. And it must have absorbed the sunlight, providing a solar energy source so that the ship never needed to land. Mort(e) recalled a photo someone had once shown him, taken from a battle in a city called Chicago that no longer existed. A group of animal soldiers had taken the picture in front of some silvery blob, a metallic sculpture. That was what the blimp resembled. It took Mort(e) a moment to recall that this memory came from his own past and not from the translator.
Mort(e)’s eyes followed the reflective skin to the stern, where the propellers spun in blurred circles, powered by the largest engines he had ever seen. Encased in the reflective metal, the turboprops were each the size of a yacht, and yet the only sound they made came from slicing through the air. There were two engines for each balloon—Mort(e) could see the bottom four from his perch on the balcony. This was not one ship but several, lashed together to support the gondola, the pressurized incubator of human civilization.
The humans gave Mort(e) and Wawa a few more seconds to take it all in. Then they led the two fugitives to a metal door with a giant wheel in the center of it. One of the humans spun the wheel, releasing the air lock. This opened to a cylindrical chamber lined with track lights. While one human closed the door behind them, shutting out the wind, the other opened the next lock. When the door released, to Mort(e)’s surprise, the smell of trees and wildlife greeted him, a humid breeze filled with the spice of pine needles and soil. It made no sense. The humans motioned for them to proceed. Wawa hesitated. “It’s better than waiting outside,” he told her.
They entered an enormous oval room, some kind of promenade, with dozens of circular windows that let in the daylight. In the middle of the room was a fountain surrounded by trees and manicured grass. Plastic pipes interlaced the little garden, leading to the bubbling oasis at the center. Mort(e) figured that they had constructed a renewable source of oxygen, clean water, and vegetables, probably adapted from Colonial technology. The humans had turned this amazing aircraft into a small Eden in the clouds, though it remained a poor imitation of what the ants had accomplished.
The rear of the room featured a small amphitheater, a meeting area with benches and chairs surrounding it. Stairways and elevators led to other levels of the cabin—Mort(e) assumed these levels included living quarters, supplies, an engine room, and maybe even a house of worship, the transmitter of EMSAH.
Dozens of humans stood about, perhaps even a hundred, some in olive military uniforms, others in blue jumpsuits. They all gasped when he entered. A few even broke down crying. There were several mothers with their children. They whispered into the little boys’ and girls’ ears, saying, That’s him. That’s Sebastian.
There was a bald man with glasses who seemed hypnotized by Mort(e)’s medallion. The man held his hand to his own chest, clutching a St. Jude necklace that wasn’t there.
A woman in a black robe stepped out of the crowd. She was middle-aged, of East Asian descent, with silver hair and wrinkles. Her robe flowed down to her feet, making it appear that she could float rather than walk. A white collar held the robe in place on her thin neck. “What happened to the man who was with you?” she asked.
“He sacrificed himself to save us,” Mort(e) said.
She gazed at the floor for a moment and cleared her throat. “I am the Archon,” she said. “We must speak alone.”
Taking his hand, she led him toward an elevator shaft. Mort(e) was so entranced by the strangeness of it all that he almost forgot about Wawa. When he searched the room for her, the Archon squeezed his hand and told him that the dog would be okay. He had already seen Wawa attack an acid-shooting Alpha with nothing more than a fireman’s axe. These humans were no match.
As the Archon guided him past the disciples, each one took a turn placing a hand on his shoulder and muttering some prayer. It took a few times before Mort(e) understood what they were saying: We are delivered. We are delivered. Seconds later, he was in the elevator with her. The Archon herself was leading him into the inner sanctum of the humans. The elevator lifted them through a transparent tube to the cabin attached to the ship’s upper chamber.
The doors slid open, revealing the Archon’s command center and personal quarters. A table was in the center of the room, draped with old yellowed maps. To the side, near a row of bookshelves, was an odd piece of artwork: a glass case with sand in it. Spaces in the sand had been carved out, like tunnels.
“I knew you would find this interesting,” she said. “It defies everything you know. It may be the last of its kind in existence.”
Mort(e) detected movement in the little tunnels. He drew closer. The motion turned out to be ants, hundreds of them, thousands, all living in a miniature version of the Colony.
“An ant farm,” the Archon said.
“How did you do this?”
“We were created to have dominion over these creatures, not the other way around. We could scoop them up from the dirt and use them for our amusement, if God willed it.”
The ants went about their business of harvesting, digging, tending to eggs. In the floating cocoon of the Vesuvius, they were mere exhibits in a zoo.
The Archon offered him a drink, pointing to a pitcher of water and a bowl on a nearby countertop. He accepted. She poured the water and handed him the bowl. Mort(e) lapped up as much as he could with each gulp.
“You remind me of a cat I used to have,” she said. “She’s gone now.”
“You had dominion over her?”
“Yes, but only after rescuing her from a pack of dogs. She lost a leg, poor thing. You see, we were not the slaveholders you think we were. We cared about you. You were our friends. We were your guardians.”
“Tell that to the dog I came here with,” Mort(e) said after finishing up the last few drops. “Her guardian kept her in a cage. Made her fight to the death.”
The Archon nodded.
“The ants are our guardians now,” he said. “That’s not working out too well, either. So you’ll have to forgive me if I’m not that excited to be here. I’m curious about what you have say. But I didn’t have much of a choice.”
“I like to think that we always have choices,” she said. “But I know how it feels when it looks like we don’t.”
She took his empty bowl and placed it on the counter. “The Colony told you that EMSAH is an acronym, right?” she asked.
“That’s right.”
“Do you know what it means?”
“I may have briefly,” Mort(e) said.
“It’s a corruption of the word messiah, first spoken by an animal who was learning how to read.”
This word sounded familiar to Mort(e). He took it to mean some kind of revolutionary. A troublemaker. But the Archon’s reverence for the term seemed to give it a different connotation.
“You, Sebastian,” she said, “you’re the messiah for the Colony, for the animals, and for us. You will deliver all three into the hands of the Lord.”
She reached out and squeezed his St. Jude medallion. Her nails were painted silver, like the hull of the ship. “It’s been a while since I’ve see one of these.”
“Listen,” Mort(e) said, “I’m not exactly sure why you picked me, but you’re mistaken. The Queen knows about your prophecy. She wants to see if I’ll decide to be your messiah or whatever you call it.”
“She has foreseen this.”
“You don’t get it,” he said. “She’s been in control the whole time. You think it’s a prophecy, but it’s another one of her experiments. It’s a test. Nothing more.”
“Has it occurred to you that the Queen fears our prophecy because it might be true?”
“The human resistance is a testament to the power of belief,” she said. “This belief is a weapon more dangerous than any the Queen has invented. It is something that she cannot understand.”
“Like death-life?”
This made her pause for a moment. “Let me show you something,” she said. “This might put things in perspective.” From a deep pocket in her robe, she pulled out a glass tube. Unscrewing the lid, she revealed an eyedropper filled with an oily liquid. She held it close to Mort(e). The liquid gave off a soapy odor.
“Do you recognize that smell?” she asked.
“No.”
She unscrewed a cap on the side of the ant farm. The opening was large enough for her to fit the eyedropper into it. She placed the point over a worker ant, who sensed the intrusion. As the ant probed the object, the Archon dripped the substance onto the insect. She withdrew the dropper and put it back into its vial. Meanwhile, the worker shuddered. Her sisters nearby went into a frenzy, first feeling one another’s antennae in consultation, then charging toward their drenched comrade, who remained still, awaiting her fate. The ants bit into her legs and thorax and dragged her toward the opening in the case, pulling so hard that Mort(e) thought they would rip her apart. The mass of ants exited the farm, so intent on removing their infected sister that they did not notice that they were free at last.
The Archon’s skeletal hand slammed down on top of them. With her other hand, she removed a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped the remains of the ants from her palms. Then she screwed the cap into place, sealing the ant farm shut.
“That substance is called oleic acid,” the Archon said. “The ants use it as a signal to indicate that something is dead and needs to be discarded from the colony.”
She laughed and shook her head. “For all their cleverness,” she said, “they are still slaves to the instincts of their species. The Queen’s war only masks her own weaknesses. This ‘experiment,’ as you call it, is merely an admission on her part that the Colony can never defeat us. She’s going mad down there, you see. Her lair has turned into an insane asylum. She is the only inmate, and her daughters have become the guards. She claims to be rational, but she envies what she cannot have. She hates what she cannot understand. She destroys what she cannot control.”
Even the Queen could not have planned the events that had unfolded, the Archon said. If Mort(e) went forward with his search, it would signal to the Queen that even the most hardhearted among the animals could be converted to the faith—and could become a new symbol of hope for the resistance. The humans had chosen their messiah, and the messiah would fulfill his destiny. And the Queen would respond by destroying everything, wiping everyone out, keeping any survivors as livestock. A final quarantine.
“Or,” the Archon said, “the messiah will lead both the humans and the animals to victory over the horde of Satan.”
Mort(e)’s love for Sheba, she said, shone like a sun on the horizon, second only to God’s love for his people. Mort(e)’s journey inspired the underground believers as much as it frightened the Queen.
“So you have a choice,” she said. “Continue on this path and trigger the final conflict between the Colony and the armies of God. Or return to the surface, abandon your quest, and roam the earth until the day you die, all the time wondering what happened to your friend.”
“You think you’ll win this final conflict?” Mort(e) asked.
“We’ll be doing God’s will. That’s more important.”
“How do you know that?”
“We know because we know,” she said, a smile curling her thin lips. “It is as simple as that.”
But this was not simple. It was a snake eating its own tail. Mort(e) had been working for the ants for so long, convinced that no one could survive without thinking rationally. And here was this cult leader speaking of magic. Mort(e) did not have the energy to question it further. It was EMSAH. There was no arguing with it. He had been trained to recognize the symptoms, not find a cure. The only cure was quarantine.
“Tell me why,” he said. “Why am I the messiah?”
“I would be honored,” she said.
AS MORT(E) SUSPECTED, the Vesuvius came equipped with a house of worship, located on the level underneath the promenade. All the humans waited for him there. Unlike the artificial surfaces of the rest of the ship, this church had wooden planks on the floors. An oak podium faced the congregation. Four children and a young woman stood at the front. In the first row, completely out of place but maintaining her calm, was Wawa. When she made eye contact with Mort(e), both shrugged. Mort(e) figured that she, too, was thinking of better ways to utilize such a large space in this city-in-the-sky.
The Archon directed him to a seat beside Wawa, then took the podium. Mort(e) nudged the lieutenant to ask if she was all right. Wawa nodded. The Archon raised her hands, and everyone quieted. For once, their eyes were focused on something other than Mort(e).
“Our God is strong,” the Archon said. There were shouts of approval over this, until everyone was applauding and stomping their feet. Mort(e) now knew why they installed wooden floors. The planks were so loud when they rattled that the ants on the ground must have sensed the vibrations.
“Our God,” the Archon continued, “has delivered our savior as promised. And now, our savior will deliver us.”
More call-and-response followed. “All right!” someone shouted in Mort(e)’s ear. “That’s right,” another said. As Mort(e) looked around at the shouting faces, he caught sight of a child at the far end of the row where he sat. The child, a boy, lay on a hospital stretcher. There was a makeshift respirator attached to his mouth and nose, with a bellows made out of a powder-blue hot-water bottle, pumping air into him. A nurse stood next to him. It was odd that they were keeping someone in this condition alive. Culdesac would have laughed at this waste of resources. Then he probably would have eaten the kid.
“Now,” the Archon said, “Miss Teter’s class of young ones will reenact the story of the Exile, as adapted from the Word.”
The Archon’s hands rested on a slim book, bound in a plain green cover. She lifted the book to her lips, kissed it, and handed it to Miss Teter. The children were poised and ready. Mort(e) noticed the costumes the students had made for themselves. One girl wore what appeared to be antlers—probably meant to be antennae, fashioned out of cardboard paper. Another girl wore fake dog ears and a tail. A boy wore cat ears. Mort(e) assumed that this child would be playing the messiah. Another boy was meant to be a plain old human. The rest of Miss Teter’s class—about fifteen students—sat cross-legged on the floor nearby.
Miss Teter opened the book. “A reading from ‘The Warrior and the Mother,’ ” she said. The people clasped their hands in reverent prayer. Many of them spoke the words along with the teacher.
“In the days of the war with no name,” she began, “all God’s children—man, beast, bird, and insect—bowed before the Queen.” The girl with the antennae kept her arms haughtily crossed. The other children knelt on the ground before her.
“The Queen of Dirt, the Monarch of the Underworld. The Devil’s Hand. She slaughtered seven times seven times seven of the humans and raised the lower species to their unnatural state.”
The boy dressed as the cat stood up. Curiously, the dog—whom Mort(e) assumed represented Sheba—remained kneeling.
The Archon nudged him and said, “Don’t worry about that ‘lower species’ stuff. It’s from an older translation.”
“The animals dreamt that they were men,” Miss Teter said, “never knowing the grace of God. And so these slaves of the New Pharaoh hunted down the last of the race of men.”
As Miss Teter described the horror of the war, several boys wearing fake dog and cat ears surrounded the children and pretended to claw at them. One by one, the children feigned death and toppled over. Some of them giggled, which caused a few of the adult audience members to laugh with them. Mort(e) and Wawa looked at each other.
“In defiance of God, the Queen raised up her own Garden of Eden,” Miss Teter said. “She said to her daughters …”
“ ‘Come, let us build ourselves a great city in the sea, an island of our own, and make a name for ourselves,’ ” the girl dressed as the Queen said.
Several of the formerly “dead” children lay down beside the Queen, acting like the landmass of the Island spreading into the sea. The Queen stood in the middle of the formation and grinned.
“But the Lord came down to see the island,” Miss Teter said. “And the Lord said, ‘These creations of mine have defied me with their arrogance. They believe now that nothing is impossible for them. They even imprison my chosen ones on their shores. Come, let us go down and thwart their plans, so that I may see a new day dawning for my people.’
“So the Lord called upon his favorites among the animals, one cat and one dog, and the boy who had been their guardian. The boy was named Michael.”
Mort(e) had heard the word Michael so many times when he was a pet—often affectionately, sometimes out of anxiety or anger. Michael was the name of Daniel’s son, the child who was placed on a bed when he was first brought home. Back when the world was much smaller.
Now the boy, Sebastian, and Sheba were alone on the stage. Their classmates quietly donned paper antennae and stood up.
“Michael was brave, a true child of the One God,” Miss Teter said. “He and his friends, Sebastian the Warrior and Sheba the Mother, represented God’s will on earth, the promise of Eden that had been abandoned. When the Queen learned of their presence in her false Jerusalem, she ordered her minions to descend upon them.”
The children dressed as ants let out a terrible scream as they surrounded the three actors. The audience joined in. Mort(e) would have thought that the adults were cheering them on if not for the genuine expressions of terror on some of their faces.
“Sebastian the Warrior fought off ten of the beasts so that Michael and his family could escape,” Miss Teter said. Meanwhile, the boy-cat pretended to claw at the horde of ants. “But Sheba was lost in the battle,” Miss Teter continued. “Wounded, Sebastian pursued her into the wilderness.”
Sebastian darted offstage.
Mort(e) shook his head. This was not how it had happened. He could not understand why the humans would have made something up when they clearly did not know what they were talking about.
“Before Sebastian could find them,” Miss Teter said, “Sheba the Mother and her friend Michael were captured and brought to the Island to stand before the Queen.” All the ant-children stood before the tyrannical monarch again. Michael and Sheba were in the center, their heads lowered in reverence.
“ ‘Who do you think you are?’ ” the little Queen asked. “ ‘How dare you defy the empire?’ ”
“But Michael was not afraid,” Miss Teter said. “He said …”
“ ‘I am Michael, a child of the Chosen,’ ” the boy replied. “ ‘Your weapons cannot strike us down. We have nothing to fear from you, for one day our Warrior will return from the wilderness to destroy every last one of your species and restore the true Eden. He has come for his friend. He fights for love, not for dominion or treasure or soil.’ ”
The congregation chanted those lines with him. Some were urging him along, but others were whipped into a trancelike state, jumping up and raising their hands, pleading for more.
“When the Queen asked what made the boy so confident,” Miss Teter said, “he responded …”
“ ‘Those who fight for God have love in their hearts. This animal returns for the love of his friend. You have no weapon to fight against this power. He will scrape your empire from the soles of his feet.’ ”
“The Queen grew vexed,” Miss Teter said, “and ordered the child and his dog to be imprisoned for the Colony’s amusement.”
“ ‘Let this warrior of yours come to us,’ ” the girl-Queen said. “ ‘We will greet him with the respect that he deserves.’ ”
“But God had mercy on Michael and said, ‘Michael, child, I shall make straight a path for you, so that you may tell the world what you have witnessed.’ And God sent his angel to shut the beasts’ jaws so that they would not hurt the boy, because he was found blameless. Thus Michael led an escape from the Island, along with his faithful disciples.”
The ant-children lay down prostrate before Michael as he calmly strolled by. Several other children represented his disciples. People in the audience clapped. Mort(e) thought that these humans had been in the zeppelin too long if they thought such an escape were possible.
“The journey to the mainland was arduous,” Miss Teter said. “Many of the disciples died. Floating on a tiny raft, Michael grew weak from lack of food and water. When they landed on the shore, a band of human fighters discovered them. They, too, were of God’s army, the last of their kind. The Lord had spoken to them in dreams, foretelling this day when a prophet would arrive. Michael’s disciples said …”
“ ‘Protect this prophet,’ ” the disciples intoned. “ ‘Do what he tells you.’ ”
“When they found the boy half-alive, half-dead,” Miss Teter said, “he whispered …”
“ ‘I have fulfilled God’s plan for me,’ ” Michael said. He was lying face up while the other children attended to him. “ ‘Another will come to take my place. He will lead you to the false Jerusalem, where you will reclaim the heritage of your ancestors. Make straight a path for him. But until then, love one another as the Warrior has loved the Mother.’ ”
The audience grew quiet, save for some intermittent weeping.
“The soldiers of God brought Michael to their camp,” Miss Teter said, “and bound up his wounds. And they continued to gaze into the wilderness, waiting for the day when the Warrior would deliver them.”
The children gazed at the wall of the church, pretending to watch the horizon. And then the boy dressed as Sebastian jumped out from behind the podium. Only this time he had a plastic sword and a crown on his head. This was apparently unexpected, for the congregants rose to their feet and applauded. Mort(e) assumed that they had been performing this little play for years, and only now could they tack on the ending that they wanted.
Amidst the noise, the Archon whispered in Mort(e)’s ear. “The story is true,” she said. “Your master’s son gathered disciples and escaped from the Colony. He was only a child, but he could see into the future. A gift from God.”
Mort(e) again turned to see the boy in the stretcher. Out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed the Archon’s hands clasped at the middle of her chest.
The congregants broke into song, something about being washed in the blood of a lamb. Beside him, Wawa swayed to the music while glancing at those around her to be sure she was doing it correctly.
“That child is our Oracle,” the Archon said in a shaky voice. “He foretold your coming even during the bleak days, when there were only a handful of us.”
With the humans singing all around him, Mort(e) walked over to the boy. The nurse, a middle-aged woman with a shaved head, nodded at him, her scalp reflecting the track lights above. The entire congregation had turned to face him. They were singing at him, as they would to some holy statue. He was their idol now.
The boy was definitely Michael. He was older, perhaps fourteen or fifteen. He smelled different, the soap and sugar replaced with sweat and peanut butter. The brown eyes were completely blank. This child did not know where he was, if he knew anything at all. If Michael’s mind were active, then it had taken him to some other place, far away from this floating church.
“The Queen,” Michael whispered. Mort(e) leaned in closer. He extended his hand, although he was not sure what he would do—put it on the boy’s shoulder? When his arm hovered over Michael, the nurse’s hand shot out and grabbed him at the wrist. She glared at him. A vein inflated on her forehead, tunneling up her bare scalp.
“Reflex,” she said. She released his wrist but kept her eyes fixed on him as a warning.
“You watch over him?” Mort(e) asked.
“Yes,” she said, “because he watched over us. He saved us from the Island.”
Mort(e) understood the determination in her eyes. This woman was Michael’s protector, as Sebastian had once been.
“The Queen,” Michael said, his eyes fluttering.
Mort(e) and the nurse leaned in to hear.
“She’s so lonely,” Michael said. “So lonely. So lonely.” He made a choking sound before repeating the phrase several more times.
“She still speaks to him,” the nurse said, showing no emotion beyond a quiet sadness over the fate of this boy. “In dreams mostly, but sometimes during the day.”
Mort(e) raised his hand to his mouth when he realized what they had done to him.
And then the nurse said bitterly, “The Queen sees—”
“Everything,” Mort(e) interrupted. “I know.”
“You’ve spoken to her?”
Mort(e) said yes.
“You’re even more special than we thought,” she whispered.
Mort(e) could not piece together the jumbled memories, but he was certain that he had come across Michael when he used the device. Maybe Michael would visit his dreams as the Queen had. Instead of a field, they would be in the Martinis’ backyard, surrounded by corpses.
Mort(e) turned and faced the Archon, his gnarled fists shaking at his sides. She stood a few feet away, clapping to the music. The singing continued, sounding no different from the broken noises of the Queen’s terrible communication device.
When she was close enough, Mort(e) grabbed her by the collar, throttling her. The singing came to an abrupt stop. “They used the translator on him, didn’t they?” he growled. “Didn’t they? That’s how they knew about me. That’s how Michael knew so much about them.”
People on either side placed their hands on his shoulders and biceps and tried to gently pull him away. He wasn’t ready to let them.
“This child has the gift of sight,” the Archon said, maintaining her calm. She nodded to the others, letting them know that it was okay. They took their hands off Mort(e). He was still breathing loudly through his snout, big, heavy breaths. Then he finally let go of her.
“Our prophet has told us things that we never could have learned on our own,” the Archon said. “He told us about you.”
“He’s not a prophet,” Mort(e) said. “The device did this to him.”
“God has chosen him,” the Archon replied. “Besides, the translator would not explain how he escaped.”
“The Queen let him escape.”
“Why would she let him get away?”
“Why would your god let him get away?”
“Michael has given us more intelligence about the Colony—all of it confirmed—than we could have ever gathered from anyone else,” she said. “God speaks through him.”
He turned to the crowd. People stood on their toes to see over one another, to see if the messiah would address them. They were ready to receive his wisdom.
“Your warrior is here,” Mort(e) said, extending his arms. The people cheered, as if he had performed a trick for them. A few fists reached for the ceiling. Some of the onlookers were so overcome with emotion that their neighbors had to support them.
“I am here to find my friend,” Mort(e) said.
“That’s right,” someone said.
“And I don’t care how many of you die in order for me to find her,” he said. A few faces dropped. Most of the others were so enraptured with his presence that they did not seem to notice. He hated them. They phrased their offer of salvation so modestly, so peacefully. But it was an offer one could not refuse, more of a threat than a promise. Join with us in friendship, they said. Or else.
“I’m not doing any of this for your god,” Mort(e) said, his voice rising. “If I have to kill everyone in this room to find her, I’ll live with that. So sing your songs and read from your magic books, talk to your little Oracle here, because I don’t give a shit.”
Mort(e) marched through the crowd to the door. He was at the foot of the steps when Wawa and the Archon caught up with him.
“Sebastian,” the Archon said.
Mort(e) stopped and stared her down. “Do you have any idea what I’m trained to do if I hear you say that name again?” he asked.
The Archon glanced at Wawa, who shook her head as if to say, Don’t ask.
“When I was still an animal,” Mort(e) said, “I swore I would kill anyone who harmed that boy. I took an oath. The only reason you’re still breathing right now is because you promised to get me to Sheba.”
“We are here to help you as much as we expect you to help us,” the Archon said.
“I’m not here to help you. I don’t need all this EMSAH nonsense. You’ve concocted some fantasy about me.”
“It’s no fantasy. Even the Queen foretold this.”
“You’ve played right into the Queen’s hands!” Mort(e) replied. “If Michael could think straight, he’d tell you. But he’s so fried that he doesn’t even remember what I did. I killed Daniel Martini.”
The Archon maintained her stony expression.
“Did you hear me?” Mort(e) asked. “I said I shot that boy’s father because of what he did to Sheba. And I didn’t make up a bunch of fairy tales so I could feel better about it.”
“Mort(e),” Wawa said, “this isn’t helping anything.”
“Oh, you want to go cuddle with these humans now?”
Mort(e) was almost ashamed of the hurt that registered on her face. “These people saved our lives,” she said.
“For what?” Mort(e) asked. “So they can start over?”
“We seek peace with all God’s children,” the Archon said.
“After you use them to finish your war,” Mort(e) said. “And what happens then? What happens when your god wants you to have pets and farm animals again?”
“That won’t happen,” the Archon said. “We tried to prove it to you earlier. Have you already forgotten that young man who gave his life to save you?”
“Of course not.”
“Neither have I,” the Archon said. “He was my son.”
A painful pause followed. Wawa let out one of her canine whines.
“So you see,” the Archon said, “we’ve sacrificed. Just like you.”
“You better pray she’s on that island,” Mort(e) said. “If she isn’t, I’m coming back here. And I will gut you in front of this whole congregation, got it?”
“She’s there,” the Archon said, pursing her lips. “Michael has never been wrong before. About anything.”
Mort(e) nodded. “Lieutenant,” he said, “you can die with these people if you want, but I’m getting my friend, and then you won’t see me again.”
“Understood, Captain,” Wawa said.
Mort(e) left them on the stairs. He wanted to sit by the fountain that the humans had built. He liked the sound of the burbling water, even if it had been poisoned with some kind of EMSAH-related significance.
From the top of the steps, he heard Wawa tell the Archon, “His name is Mort(e).”