The Heirs of Earth

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

For the first time in years, Belowgen returned home.

He flew the shuttle out from Paradise Lost, the space station he had been running for years. He sailed past Terminus Wormhole, the last wormhole in Concord territory, marking the border with the Hierarchy. He turned his shuttle, heading down toward the swampy planet below. His homeworld. Planet of the marshcrabs. Akraba.

He shuddered, legs clattering.

Belowgen had been born on that marshy world, the runt of his brood. His legs were too short, his mandibles too small, and the females scorned him, refused to let him fertilize their eggs. He had left Akraba in shame, found work on Paradise Lost. For long years, he had toiled as a janitor, mopping toilets and laundering brothel sheets, finally working his way up to Head Administrator.

I always thought I would return home wealthy and powerful, he thought. Not like this. Not with humans infesting my space station.

Akraba hovered before him, growing to fill his field of vision. Swamps covered the planet. Here was a world of twisting trees, blankets of fog, grassy tussocks, pits of mud, and buzzing insects. A world of rich aromas: moss, fungi, and rotting carcasses. A world of heat, dampness, and eggs. A world of old pain.

Belowgen landed on a muddy hill, lowered the hatch, and emerged from his starship.

The air washed across him, as hot and thick as chowder. Mist caressed his shell. Belowgen paused and inhaled, savoring it. So many smells! The moss. The mud. The water, rich with leeches. The insects that fluttered, bellies full of blood. The dead animals rotting in the mud. Somewhere in the distance—a female gravid with eggs, ready to lay them into the rot. A symphony of smells!

Trees rose across the swamplands, their roots not buried underground but rising high above the mud, tall and thin like Belowgen's legs. Indeed, marshcrabs legs had evolved to blend among these roots. Coated with mud and leaves, a marshcrab looked like yet another swamp tree. This was Belowgen's home. The place where a marshcrab belonged.

For a moment, Belowgen could only stand still, overwhelmed, letting this world heal all his stress.

He reached into the mud and pulled out a rotting dead fish. Not a mere water nymph like he bought in Paradise Lost. An actual carcass, muddy and filled with worms. He feasted. The juices flowed down his throat, and he shuddered with delight.

I missed this place, he thought. I fit here.

But he had not come here to reminisce. He had come here on a mission. To save his space station. To save this planet. Indeed, to save the galaxy.

Belowgen walked through the swamp. His claws sank into the mud. The fog rolled and insects chirped. An oily black bird cawed, circling above.

He looked around him. Several females stood between the roots of trees, their legs like more roots, their shells caked with mud and leaves. They were so well camouflaged Belowgen would normally not see them, but today they were in heat, releasing an intoxicating miasma, summoning worthy males. Even through the rich swampy aroma, Belowgen could smell the eggs lying in the mud beneath them, waiting for a male to fertilize them. Yet when they saw Belowgen walk by, the females huddled lower over their eggs and glared at him.

You are not worthy! their eyes said. They expelled a stench, a signal to usher him along.

Belowgen walked away in a huff.

You will beg me to fertilize your eggs once I'm heralded as the slayer of humans!

He walked onward, leaving the haughty females behind. Finally he reached the Great Henge.

A ring of iron shards rose on a hilltop like a jagged crown. Centuries ago, the shards had fallen from the sky, but they had never rusted, not even in the swamp. The ancient marshcrabs had believed them the blades of gods. They had dug the relics from the mud and arranged them into a henge, forming a holy place for the elders to gather.

Today marshcrabs had seen space, understood technology, and even built starships of their own from parts they purchased from other species. Today marshcrabs recognized these fallen shards as debris from an ancient space battle. And yet the Great Henge was still holy, and the elders of the swamps still gathered here.

Belowgen walked between two of the towering iron shards, pieces of an ancient hull. Within the henge, he saw the elders.

They stood in a ring, each marshcrab with his back to a relic shard. They were towering crabs, wise and powerful, mighty breeders who had fertilized many eggs. Their shells were not rusty-red like Belowgen's. As elders, they had shed their red exoskeletons, and their new shells were deep brown mottled with black warts. To this day, every female offered them her eggs, and their offspring crawled across the swamps.

"Walk forth, young Belowgen," said an elder, his white barbels fluttering over his mouth. "Your news has concerned the council. Come tell us more."

Belowgen stiffened his joints, steeling himself. He had never stepped into the Great Henge before. This was an honor! He only wished he could come with better tidings.

He walked into the center of the henge. The mud was soft and rich here, deeply aromatic, filled with oozing rot. The finest animals were brought to decay here, to fill the henge with their nutrients. The elders stood around Belowgen, staring from every side. He wanted to cringe under their stare, to drown in the mud, but forced himself to stay standing.

Someday I vow to become an elder myself, he thought. To stand in this henge and feed from this mud. To fertilize any eggs I desire.

"Tell us your tidings," said an elder. "Tell us of . . . the humans."

The other elders hissed and clacked their mandibles.

"Pests!" they said. "Vermin! Crawling evil!"

Belowgen nodded. "They are indeed pests, wise elders. And they are evil. And they have infested Paradise Lost."

He spent a while telling the tale. How the human named Rowan had crawled into the ducts, evading every exterminator. How she had been breeding in the walls. How he had hired the bonecrawlers, the most expensive exterminators in the galaxy, yet even they had failed. How the humans were breeding again, had multiplied to three, would soon become three hundred, then three millions.

"They will overwhelm Paradise Lost!" Belowgen said. "And they will reach even Akraba and spread. They will dry up our swamps, and disperse our fog, and cut down our trees. They will ruin this world. They are an ancient evil, one we cannot defeat alone."

The elders looked at one another, huffing. For a long while, they muttered amongst themselves, voices too low for Belowgen to hear. Insects buzzed around them, and slugs sloshed through the mud. The sun reached its zenith, a splotch behind the fog and clouds, heating the rancid air into a thick stew.

Finally one of the marshcrabs, the eldest with the thickest shell, clattered forward. He cleared his throat and spoke with a raspy voice, barbells fluttering.

"Our path is clear. The humans are too much of a danger. We cannot let them spread." The elder huffed. "The only race that can exterminate the humans is the Skra-Shen, the great scorpions, masters of the Hierarchy. Their claws are sharp. Their shells are thick. They are arachnids like we are, yet even mightier. We will call the scorpions. We will join them. We will summon their armies here. Akraba will withdraw from the Concord, this weak alliance that cannot protect us shelled creatures, and join the Hierarchy!"

"Hail the Hierarchy!" cried the other elders. "Hail the Hierarchy!"

"Hail the Hierarchy!" Belowgen called with them.

His barbels fluttered with excitement, and he huffed and grunted with joy. Yet as Belowgen was flying back to Paradise Lost, leaving his homeworld below, he gazed across the border into the darkness, and his legs clattered with fear.