Havoc

22 The Past Is Another Country

A day later, they were still mopping vomit off the floor and blood from the walls. Hell of a send-off. Ike might even approve. After Jael left the common room with Dred, the populace apparently ran amok, with the usual results and casualties. People were still sullen, nursing grievances that sprang out of nowhere. Or at least, it seemed that way to Jael.

Maybe it was more accurate to say that liquor gave men the courage to say shit they’d never otherwise admit. As a result, tensions were high today. A number of Queenslanders had only pretended to accept the admission of the aliens, intimidated by the example Dred made of the man who disagreed with her decision. Since nobody wanted to end up like that, their complaints had gone quiet, confined to whispers that stilled as soon as Jael approached.

Good thing they don’t know I can hear them from here.

“I can’t believe we have to share bunk space with those freaks,” a Queenslander was saying.

“They’re eating up our food,” someone else complained.

“If I’d known the Dread Queen was such a sympathizer, I’d have—”

“What?” Brahm stood behind the group, talons splayed.

At his back, there were a number of aliens from the Warren, some of whom Jael knew by name, like Ali. The rest he had no experience with, so he couldn’t be sure how quickly this situation would escalate. And he wasn’t sure of his role anyway. Maybe Dred would be pissed if he stepped in, like he held actual power.

But Cook solved the problem by hurling his knife. It thunked into the table where the xenophobes were sitting. The handle quivered as the man stalked over to retrieve the weapon. He paused for a few seconds in silence before picking it up. Not surprisingly, the malcontents found other places they needed to be. Satisfied, Cook went back to his pot.

“Sorry about that,” Jael said to Brahm.

The Ithtorian still gave him the creeps, but he knew better than to blame Brahm for the shit he’d gone through on Ithiss-Tor. It was a personal bias, one he was struggling with, and he didn’t intend to make a public issue of it. But the alien regarded him for a few seconds out of side-set eyes without speaking.

“You have a problem with me,” he said.

“Not like they do,” he answered, defensive.

The Ithtorian clicked out a laugh. “No, your issue is specific to my kind. I don’t notice it around the rest.” He turned to his companions and waved them away. Ali seemed most reluctant, but she eventually moved off, presumably so Brahm could speak to Jael in private.

Once they were alone, relatively speaking, Jael said, “It doesn’t matter. I won’t move on you if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Brahm tilted his head, mandible moving in a way that Jael recognized as being a thoughtful gesture. He’d learned a lot about Bug body language during his long incarceration. He wished the cues didn’t make him want to pull Brahm’s head off.

“I’m not. You seem to have more honor than that.”

“Seem being the operative word.”

“The Dread Queen relies on you. And we’ve noticed that her advisors are a cut above the rest of the population.”

Jael wasn’t sure where this conversation was going. “Thanks. I think.”

“But you’re naïve if you think our assimilation will pass without bloodshed.”

“That’s not something I’ve been accused of before.” The Ithtorian wasn’t wrong, though. He saw the tension growing as the days rolled on. Sooner or later, it would explode.

“I imagine not. The interesting thing about you, downright intriguing, in fact . . . is that I’ve been speaking Ithtorian for the last few minutes.”

Now that Brahm had pointed it out, Jael registered the clicks and chitters that comprised the Ithtorian native tongue. The alien stood there, silently awaiting an explanation, and Jael gave it reluctantly. “I spent some time in the Ithtorian penal system. They chipped me, so I could understand orders the guards gave me.”

Mostly it had consisted of turn around, present your limbs to be shackled, and step out of the cave so we can hose it down. Not exactly scintillating conversation. But limited interaction was better than nothing, better than silence. Yet Brahm went still, his mandible locked in a position Jael identified as tension.

“You’re the one.”

Before he spoke, he suspected. “Pardon me?”

“You’re the man who tried to murder my father.”

Shit. Brahmel Il-Charis. Charis Il-Wan. There had been a reason the name sounded familiar, but it’d been so long. Jael didn’t take a step back even as the Ithtorian moved forward. He blocked when the Ithtorian reached out slowly with razor-sharp talons.

“If I was a better scion, I’d cut your throat,” Brahm said in universal.

The men nearby froze at that, and Jael knew they’d back him if it came to a fight. Can’t let this escalate. Ali stood with the rest of the aliens, but she was clearly paying attention to Brahm. At a gesture from him, they would wade in. He didn’t see Katur or Keelah anywhere, so that was a blessing. Their presence might put the stamp of approval on a bloodbath, so far as the rest of the aliens were concerned. While they were loyal, they lacked the ferocity necessary to kill everyone in the room.

That’s because they’re not killers by nature.

“I could make excuses,” he answered. “Say it was just a job, nothing personal. But it is personal for you. So that wouldn’t help.”

“You took the coward’s path, poisoned him.”

Jael wanted to ask if there was a good way to murder someone, but levity would only worsen the situation. A couple of Queenslanders pushed to their feet and came to stand at his shoulder. By the smell, it was the ones who had been complaining about the aliens. Yeah, they’ll love it if this explodes.

“This is between him and me,” Jael said over one shoulder.

Then he faced Brahm again. “What will square this? A grudge match?”

The Ithtorian spread his claws. “I bear you no malice. My only regret is that you didn’t succeed.”

“What the hell—”

“I did say if I were better. I loathe Charis Il-Wan, and I wish I’d poisoned him.” So saying, Brahm shocked the shit out of Jael by offering his claw, human-style, for a clasp.

Recovering, Jael shook his hand, wondering exactly what the Bug politician had done to his offspring to make Brahm wish he’d killed his old man. The tension seeped from the room like air slowly escaping a balloon. Little by little, the Queenslanders went about their business, and the aliens left the hall entirely.

“I can safely say I didn’t see that coming. How did you end up here anyway?” Maybe Brahm was the exception, an alien who had been locked up for capital crimes.

“I was banished from Ithiss-Tor. It was bad luck that landed me here, got caught up in immigration sweeps on New Terra, like everyone else.”

“I don’t understand that,” Jael said. “Why not just deport the lot of you?”

“Most of us know something about the current administration. It would be . . . inconvenient to have us revealing that information.”

Given what he knew about the government, he wasn’t surprised. “Pardon me. I shouldn’t have pried. That goes against the code.”

“You’ll note I didn’t volunteer anything about my exile.”

“Noted.”

With a parting nod, Jael excused himself and went to join a card game. He played for several hours, while the men around him gradually relaxed. There was nothing for winding convicts up like the promise of violence. But the common room was much emptier than it had been when he first arrived. Full tables sat vacant, chairs never to be filled. When you looked at the conflict as a war of attrition, it was hard to imagine anything but inevitable loss.

The crowd thinned even further as the hour got later. He wasn’t paying full attention to his hand, so he lost more than he won. No, it was the activity among the alien-haters that troubled him. They slipped in and out, never more than one or two at a time, and they had the shifty look of assholes up to no good. One man stole up to another, whispered in his ear, then left. The other one waited for a couple of minutes before taking off after him. Yeah, that’s a sure sign they’re rallying. Cook turned off his equipment and headed for the dorm, so there would be no backup from that quarter.

Quietly, he threw down his cards. “I fold.”

The rest of the gamblers hardly glanced up when he slid out of the hall. The conspirator glanced both left and right before bearing left. The training room was this way; so was the armory. Jael half expected the man to stop and fiddle with the lock, but instead he kept moving, quickening to nearly a run, as if the anticipation had grown too much to bear.

He grabbed a man who was on his way to his bunk, and ordered, “Go find the Dread Queen. Send her to me immediately. If you fail, you’ll wish you were dead.”

Gulping, the drafted messenger took off at a run.

Jael didn’t know what he expected to find, but the reality was worse. The men had captured an assortment of aliens, Keelah among them, and they were bound to support beams in the training room. The bastards had grabbed the weakest among them, too, so Ali and Brahm were both conspicuously absent. Some of them were bleeding while others trembled in anticipation of pain to come. Now he understood why they had been traveling in pairs, better to pounce on a single target and drag him off.

He slammed a palm against the door as he strode through. “I’m damn sure the Dread Queen didn’t approve this. Which means it amounts to treason.”