Botanicaust (5 page)

The tech raised his brows but nodded and herded the man across the tarmac. Mo grabbed her hand and pulled her the other direction.
“
Can you take off, now? Let the techs handle it tonight?
”

“
I have two children I really ought
—
”

He halted mid-step and pulled her into his arms, seizing her mouth in a kiss. The euphoric chemicals passed into her in a rush, making her head swim and her body flush with desire. He pulled back and she looked with blurred vision into his tawny eyes.
“
You really are high, aren
’
t you?
”
she asked.

“
Want some more?
”
He kissed her again, running his tongue along her gum line. She swayed in his arms.
“
You
’
re a lightweight,
”
he murmured against her lips.

“
Shut up and take me home.
”

Blattvolk Prison

Haldanian Protectorate

Levi paced the bars of his cell, inspected the automatic toilet facility again, and paused to check on the woman from the desert lying on the cot in his cage. They
’
d brought her in a few moments ago, her head completely shaven, her newborn at her naked breast.

God was surely punishing him. His people had sealed the Blattvolk out along with the rest of the world in the Days of the Prophet;
their
green skin the undeniable Mark of the Beast. The salt trader still brought news of them, and they were not supposed to range that far north.

He ran a hand over his
bald head
and face. The first thing the Blattvolk had done was strip him and put him into a stinging shower. When he emerged, he was as hairless as a newly picked apple. Even the mustache he
’
d allowed to grow over the course of his journey was gone, like a reminder from God of his disobedience.

Mercifully, they
’
d given him a blanket with which to cover himself. The abominations wore next to nothing, their shameful display of bare skin a distraction in and of itself. The fact that they were green only added to the atrocity.

Night and day were the same in this basement prison. The large cement-brick room held eight cages, three of which housed prisoners. Two children in the other cages slept, but the ugly fluorescent lighting hadn
’
t dimmed. The cages were accessible from all four sides, containing prisoners like animals on display.

A thin, green man emerged from the hall carrying a tray with metallic cylinders. The abomination was unclothed except for a thin loop of fabric around the waist that barely covered the genitals, and a shameful amount of jewelry at the wrists and ankles. Even the man
’
s short hair glinted with shiny, green glass beads.

Levi averted his eyes to a spot above the creature
’
s head to avoid looking at his nudity.
“
You have to let me go. My child is in danger.
”

The Blattvolk didn
’
t respond. He set a container into the cage and said a word the woman seemed to understand. Rousing from the bed, she kept a wary eye on the visitor and edged toward the cylinder.

“
Please!
”
Levi approached the bars and the Blattvolk shook his head and backed a few steps from the cage.

Extending a hand holding a cylinder, the creature offered it to Levi. He said a word Levi didn
’
t understand.

Levi shook his head.

In the far corner of the cage, the woman lifted the metal container to her nose and sniffed. Before Levi could stop her, she put her lips to the edge and tipped it.
“
No, wait!
”
Too late, he saw her throat moving as she swallowed.

The Blattvolk nodded toward her, and Levi backed to the center of the cage. Was this how they transformed their captives? Surely it couldn
’
t be that easy? He watched the woman with concern.

With a sigh, the green man set Levi
’
s cylinder inside the cage bars. Again, he spoke some words Levi didn
’
t understand, turned, and placed cylinders into the other cages before disappearing down the hallway. The children in the other cells scrambled forward and drank with gusto.

The baby started crying and the woman offered a breast. She seemed unconcerned for her nakedness. But then, she was a cannibal. To keep his eyes averted as she cared for the child, Levi picked up his own cup. Inside was a milky substance without much of a smell. His stomach rumbled, but he set the cup down unsampled.

He didn
’
t want to sleep, especially caged with a cannibal. But between his travels and all the excitement of being captured, he was exhausted. If she wanted to eat him, she had nothing but her hands and teeth to do it. Sitting on the floor facing the cot, he propped himself against the bars and arranged the blanket to cover as much of his body as possible. If he remained sitting, perhaps he would not sleep. He longed for his paper and pencil.
Something to help him focus his mind on anything but his fate.

The woman approached his rejected cylinder, her focus on him shrewd. He shrugged and gestured for her to take it. She grabbed it and returned to the cot to slurp noisily. At least her belly should be full. His eyes closed, just for a moment.

He woke to the baby crying. The woman couldn
’
t quiet the infant, and she frantically paced the cage. She had the child wrapped in the other blanket, leaving herself bare, and Levi couldn
’
t help but notice how young she was. She was barely more than a child herself. The calluses on her feet made scuffing noises along the cement as she paced.

“
Try singing,
”
he said. He remembered Sarah
’
s sweet voice as she sang to Josef in those few days she
’
d been alive to hold him. His heart ached.

The mother met his gaze and
he was struck by her fierce eyes
. He
’
d never seen a full-blooded cannibal up close. The feral intellect in her stare made him aware of just how different she was from his people.

Still, she did seem to be trying to be a good mother.

Rising from the floor, he held out his hands.
“
Let me try?
”

This caused the woman to clutch the baby tighter and back against the
cage,
obviously assuming he meant to harm the child.

Tone deaf himself, Levi hummed a few bars of a common lullaby. The girl showed no recognition. No surprise there. He made a rocking motion with his arms.

She bounced the squalling baby and glared at him.

He wondered how often cannibals ate their young.

Shaking off the awful thought, he sat against the bars and tried not to look at the unclothed woman sharing his cage. The problem was, there wasn
’
t anything else to look at. His stomach rumbled loudly.

And then the thought occurred to him; maybe he was in Hell already.

Tula watched the little family on the monitor, fascinated by the dynamics of the couple. Normally, the baby would have been converted and moved to the infant Gardens
—
without her mother. But this was a rare opportunity to observe a real, live, nuclear family, untainted by the necessity of the protective Gardens. She
’
d stayed up most of the night searching the database for old psych evaluations on nuclear ties, hoping to understand their interactions and apply what she learned with future potential converts.

The woman paced the cell, jostling the baby as the man watched. They seemed to distrust each other, and yet the huge man obviously wanted to care for the child. Was this normal cannibalistic parental interaction? She seldom dealt with adults, and never adults in a relationship.

Maybe he
just
wants to eat the baby.

She couldn
’
t shake the feeling the man on the monitor didn
’
t belong in the picture. Normally, she didn
’
t bother with the items prisoners had on them when they were captured. All items went to the incinerator, since such things only served to remind converts of a life they needed to forget if they were to properly integrate.

As she watched the cell monitor, she flipped through the pages of the crude notebook, the paper dry and brittle between her fingers. Had the man made these drawings? The woman in the sketches looked nothing like the woman in the cell, and Tula wondered who she might be. Not even the Fosselites used paper any more, as far as she knew. Had he stolen the book from some ancient treasure trove in the wilderness?

She watched the screen and skimmed the pages until it was time for the next feeding, then delivered the protein drinks to the prisoners. The children in the front cells scrambled toward her when she entered, begging for sweets.

“
How are you today, Rhomy? Did you draw something for me?
”
She held the treat just out of the girl
’
s reach, waiting for an answer.

“
Good. I
’
m good.
”
Rhomy stretched through the bars as far as she could.

“
What did you draw?
”
Tula pointed to the flat sheet of a child
’
s gamma pad on the floor of the cage. One of her exercises with potential converts was putting Haldanian words to things they drew.

“
Tula.
”
The girl retrieved the gamma pad and showed the crude picture of a green face to her. Rhomy had taken to color quickly, once she had learned to activate the palette, but her fine motor skills were lacking.

“
You drew me yesterday. What else can you draw?
”

The girl in the next cage produced her gamma pad as well, and clamored for attention.
“
I draw. I draw. Food. I draw food.
”

Tula stepped over and accepted the gamma pad. The picture clearly depicted a stylized bone with meat on it. She repressed a shudder. Training the carnivore out of the cannibal was not easy.
“
Can you draw sunshine?
”

The child traced a circle in the air and indicated spikes coming off it.

“
Great!
”
Tula handed the girl a sweet.

Rhomy cried out,
“
Me!
”

“
What else can you draw?
”

The girl again showed the gamma pad.
“
Me!
”
It was the same face, and Tula thought a moment.