by Jay Morris
Some Da-Nah tried to fight them, but for every Da-Nah there were dozens, perhaps hundreds of the things. The creatures were blindingly fast, worked in rudimentary hunter killer teams to isolate small groups of Da-Nah and massacre them. The battle lasted less than 1/20th of a planetary rotation. Once the vast majority of the Da-Nah were dead, or so badly wounded they could no longer resist, Ga-At-Ta-E, So-Na and the handful of frightened Da-Nah who cowered in their hiding places bore witness to an unimaginably horrific event.
From the jungle on both side of the trail, shyly at first and then with more boldness, came the young with their mothers. The creatures pushed their young forward, urging them to dine on the often still living Da-Nah. Small groups of females formed around the dominant males. The males ate, the offspring, some just fresh from hatching, ate next, then the mated females, then the less dominant males.
Ga-At-Ta-E could not tear his eyes away as the Da-Nah were eaten by creatures of their own design, creatures intended to die after thirty planetary rotations, creatures who had through some quirk of genetics survived, survived and reproduced.
Epilog, Seattle Washington
I once saw a graph that showed the population of the Earth growing and growing as an ever increasing rate. Even the Black Death in the Dark Ages just made a little dip in it. I imagine that when the Da-Nah moved against us, that graph took a dramatic, precipitous drop, almost to zero. Almost.
The Da-Nah made the Before, the Before nearly wiped out mankind, Tucker spared an underling, the underling helped us win a war we never could have won by ourselves. That was 67 years ago. I guess I don’t have to tell you what came After, but I’m an old man and I’m going to anyway.
We made it without too much difficulty all the way to Seattle, there were sadly few individuals we came across, although we did find a pretty good sized community of Navajo who had taken up residence in a pueblo. We picked up a total of 12 people on the way, three men, two women and the rest were kids under 10. After two months I was let in on the secret, Karen was pregnant. She had avoided me and to be honest until I found out about the baby I tried to not think about her at all. But my perspective changed after that, I knew that if I didn’t do something then I would quickly be cut out of the baby’s life. Karen would turn to Amy and the underling, maybe even Kristin and Jodi. The fact that I didn’t even really know if it was mine or not didn’t cross my mind well, okay it did, but not more than 60 or 70 times a day.
I finally sucked it up, I figured that she would blame me for Dustin’s death, you know because I didn’t want to be a third wheel and all. Turns out she did blame me, so I was right. Whoopee, one-zip. I told her that I was truly sorry that he was dead, she said I was a liar, so she was right. Score tied, one-one. She said that I had been jealous, and by taking the ring back I had set things off (I noticed she didn’t even say the name Tucker), so she was right again. Two to one, seventh inning stretch. She said I wasn’t her father, and not her owner, we had been married, partners. Ouch. Four to one after the ‘not her father’ and the past tense of married. Bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, two strikes. So, I had one thing left.
“Is the baby mine?”
She started to cry but finally, with tears rolling down her cheeks, her head nodding affirmative she said,
“I don’t know.”
Home run. I win. I wished I had lost.
But in the long run we decided that I would be the daddy, even if we were not together anymore. Six months later we had a son, she wanted to name it Dustin, and I maturely threatened to kill myself. So we agreed on Carl instead.
Time went on and eventually we got back together, on Carl’s third birthday matter of fact. We got married again and this time it stuck, we had three more children another boy, Kyle, and twin girls Elaine and Sharon after my sister and my mother. We were married for 58 years before Karen, my Karen, died in her sleep. Tucker once said that he had known true love once, and that he should have been happy with that. I can tell you that as far as I am concerned he was right.
Let’s see, oh, Amy never married again although she had several boyfriends over the years. She spent most of her time in the Planning Committee and was responsible for both the Local Area Defense Plan but also the creation of the school system. She also was on the Basis Team for the North American Union, twice. They had moved the capitol of the union to where Boulder Colorado used to be, so it wasn’t that far.
Gina eventually married Chase and they had seven children in ten years before he was killed in the first North African campaign to try and stop the evolved Before from migrating to Europe. Lucy was with him at the end and she said he spoke, in only a whisper, for the first and last time, he said, “Tell Gina thank you.”
Lucy, how do I explain Lucy? Well, she is still fearless, maybe in part because where ever she goes she has her very own personal weapon system with her. At twenty-three she was elected Defense Leader for all of the northwest Americas. At twenty eight she took over the North African command when her three superiors were killed by the Before. She did two terms as Joint Chiefs military advisor to the Basis Team. At age 33, when she returned from successfully defending Crete from a new breed of amphibious Before, she came home very, very pregnant. She refused to name the father or even talk about him, but her daughter, Caroline, was so much like Lucy I wondered if she had somehow cloned herself. Jodi, in many ways lived the most undamaged life of us all. She was still crazy as a jay alright but she lived a wonderful life in her private fantasy world. She and Krista were together all the time, their children Maverick and Junior were constant playmates and best friends. It turns out that Da-Men (Da-Nah babies raised in human society) mature much slower than humans and live far longer, as do the underling. So when Jodi passed away, Junior was in the equivalent of his early teens. They had been together 44 years and I can honestly say not once did I see them have a cross word or be anything except loving. Yes, I said “word”, Junior learned to speak although you have to listen carefully because he sounds like he has a kazoo stuck in his throat, that and his “t’s” sound a lot like *click*.
Then there was, or should I say is, Tucker. He doesn’t speak, he heals incredibly quickly from wounds that would have been fatal to anyone else, his muscles are enhanced and skeletal system is armored. He can run as fast as a leopard for short distances or he can maintain a solid eight miles per hour indefinitely. In battle he is merciless, ruthless and a mechanical killer. But as far as I know Dustin was the last human being he killed. He also doesn’t seem to age, even the underling don’t know his life expectancy. They are baffled as much as anyone, he is what he is. Lucy’s silent companion and body guard, where she goes, he goes. He will ignore directives from the underling seemingly at will, but never fails to obey Lucy.
The military tried to reproduce the process that created Tucker to no avail, but I have a theory about that. I think the underling feel so bad about creating him they intentionally have failed at reproducing the process.
So, here we are, trying to rebuild humanity, trying to build a new society out of tens of thousands of humans, thousands of underling, a few hundred Da-Men and one Tucker. All of us, rebuilding a damaged and nearly vacant world, trying to recover from the First Da-Nah War, and trying to prepare for the second.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have to lay down, my back is killing me.
Epilog, Continued, the Da-Nah Nexus
The secretary to the Nexus-Council-3 hurried to the Great Hall. The meeting was already in progress and he had to deliver the update as soon as possible, Slipping through the rear portal he quietly approached his superior and when there seemed to be an appropriate moment he handed the com-pad to one of then eleven most powerful Da-Nah in the known universe. Then, data delivered he waited while the message was processed, finally, Nexus-Council-3 held his hand over a sensor adding himself to the queue. When the sensor turned white, he spoke
“Insistive-Statement-Factual Broadcast (Council-3, Council-All)
Composit
e :{
Da-Nah Vessel-Designation-Scout-11324-89, Interception-Specific
Speed-of-Light-Message-Source (Colony 15638)
Emergency-Protocols Status-Update-Validated Composite :{
Indigenous-Life-Aggressive
Lethality-Original-Coefficient-Incorrect
Indigenous-Life-Aggressive
Lethality-Modified-Coefficient(1.0 Asymptotic)
Protocols-Insufficient
Fatalities-Da-Nah Quantity-Estimate (0.38)”
Council-3 had to wait for his peers to calm down before continuing
Protocols-Original –Effectiveness-Quantity-Estimate (0.24+delta)
Protocols-Original-Details-Encoded
Implicative (Negation-Conjunctive
(Da-Nah-Nexus, Support), Colonization-Failure) Details-encoded };
Again he waited for the debate to settle down before he gave the rest of his news.
Da-Nah Vessel-Designation-Scout-11324-89,
Statement-Factual-Composite
:{ Da-Nah Digital-Speed-of-Light-Communications Quantity-Precise (0.0)
Faster-than-Light-Drone-Conjunctive (Deployed, Negation-Response)
};
};
After he was finished the Nexus-Council debated for almost an entire Nexus-Chronal-Unit but there was really only one possible decision. Only one possible response. When the Da-Nah were threatened in such a manner, the Nexus-Council would vote unanimously to retrieve the Protocol-Archives. They would vote unanimously to open the ancient technology vaults that had been sealed for millennia. In fact the Nexus-Council did so vote; the Da-Nah were going to war.
