Before they left she flashed a menacing smile at them without allowing them to see what she was visualizing. She didn’t want them to have time to adapt before her plans could be put to good use. But when the time was right, they’d have to learn to respond to her requests just as her mount did, or face the crippling pain. Because like it or not, the Umbrage had been born with the headgear on. Try as Laney might, she couldn’t break Mudra’s simultaneous access to the Umbrage’s biogenesis.
The Umbrage fled the arena.
Finding the wider streets blocked at the ends by the sealed pods not meant for them because they were too big, they fled down still narrower side streets until they found their way into the escape pods they were destined for. Laney wondered how Truman had anticipated for species diversification of this sort well in advance. But she figured, in the final analysis, it was consistent with his thinking about the genetic mutability of his sentient serpents.
Laney had come in late on the sentient serpents’ training program. Just in time to put the finishing polishes on the last of the graduates before they were released into the jungle. She may have hated Truman from this point forward, but there was no denying he was a master chess player of the first order, foreseeing things to come many moves ahead. Down to her imprisonment in a block of ice in time to launch his latest campaign against Leon and his boys along the Amazon River basin.
She shuddered at how much she had played into Truman’s hands simply following her natural inclinations to ease the suffering of the creatures being used as gladiators against their will. By predicting how she would react, he had played her and she’d allowed herself to be played. And now she feared the worst for Natty, Leon, and all of OMEGA FORCE and ALPHA UNIT.
Worse yet, her twin sister Cassandra was down there hiding somewhere on the forest floor. Their psychic connection stronger than ever, bolstered as it was by the chip on Laney’s forehead, Laney could see that Truman had succeeded in getting both twins to bolster his war games. If the twins were stronger together than apart, then he’d managed to make even that work for him. She really had no idea how they were going to get around this guy. For all their abilities, Truman’s strategic thinking, always several moves ahead, seemed to make him invulnerable. Laney doubted even Leon’s tactical-mindedness was any match for him.
Truman, in all likelihood, would achieve everything he wanted. Namely for his war games in the jungle to perfect the use and deployment of his latest assets, which might otherwise need prolonged debugging without the assistance of Natty, Laney, Cassandra, and Leon and his teams. Truman was making the most of the magical way in which the foursome came together to produce the synergies he needed to advance the tech decades in days.
He heard Truman in her head chuckling, trying his best not to gloat, but that was against his nature. “At first,” he said, “the old man, Jacko, alone seemed able to control the really big ones, the dinosaurs you refer to as the Nomads. Proof that if you want greater savagery, you have to go further back in time. The genes get polluted and degraded with each successive generation. But we employed the same devices they’re using on the creatures on his kids. The old man breaking the wildness out of his own children and getting them up to his standards of savagery. Really, the only missing piece was you, Laney. We couldn’t figure out how to make the sterile creatures fertile and self-reproducing. Far less able to species diversify in a single generation. Thanks for that.” He reprised his laughter, which echoed inside her head.
“Why would you want these things to procreate?”
“At the time we didn’t. Thought their sterility a bonus. Gave us greater control. But now I’ve come to realize that I’m cobbling my greatest weapon. How am I to take advantage of their tremendous propensity for genetic diversity, for mutated genes at the slightest environmental stressor if I can’t get them to reproduce? Better yet, to replicate like rabbits? Think of all the environmental stressors in the Amazon rainforest today, Laney? The pollution flowing down the Amazon River? Hell, even the dolphins are growing legs and the frogs wings.
“Just wait till these guys, with their less stable genome, are exposed to all that. It’ll be a new Cambrian explosion of life, all answerable to my trainers, and to me, of course. All far more responsive to the whip than any lion or elephant. Fear isn’t just their motivator, it’s their god. Remember, from our own reptilian brain which we carry to this day, we know that it is above all else, fear driven. And who better at wielding fear than corporations? We’ve even gotten our psy-ops games to work against humans who over time surrender their higher brains to their lower brains. But it’s such a messy affair. With the reptiles, there is no higher brain to strip away. You see why I needed you now, Laney? We’re going to build the future together, you and I, and what a grand future it shall be.”
“You’re mad.”
“I say I’m inspired. But let’s not get lost in the semantics of it all. Are you ready to play ball, or shall you see your beloved sentient serpents suffer even more than they have to on your account?”
She hated herself for saying it but she did, “I’ll play ball.” She sighed. “I will need access to an operating theater. There’s only so much psychic surgery I can do from a distance. Certain things just require a more hands-on approach. I think with my hands and my other senses. Get clues from scents picked up by my olfactory receptors, from the taste buds in my mouth. This avatar doesn’t deny me access to all five senses, but it mutes them. You want me to finish freeing your sentient serpents, you need to free me first.”
Truman nodded as he processed the information, his gesture indicating acceptance of her proposal even before his brain had finished signing off on it. “Very well, as much as I hate to surrender the visual symbolism of praying to my God on the altar of my ice queen, I’ll grant your wish. Just so happens I have a lab in the jungle—I mean, what self-respecting third-world exploitationist corporate exec doesn’t?—where you can ply your trade.”
***
“They say vengeance is a gift best served cold. Well my ice queen,” Truman said, stroking the block of ice through which he beheld her. “You’re about to show them just how cold it can be.” He laughed. “I can already see it, dinosaurs with metal-polymer scales impervious to bullets and rocket launchers, unaffected after so many generations even by atomic blasts. Mutating with each new weapon they’re exposed to into something that’s immune to that approach. Until one day they’re unstoppable despite anything we can throw at them on earth. And who knows, maybe one day, anything the heavens can throw at them. But one world at a time,” Truman said laughing. “We still have this one to conquer yet.”
“What makes you think they won’t turn on you?” Laney said.
“Who, us, the fear mongers? If fear is the only thing they understand, then we will be their gods. How often do you know mortals to turn on their gods?” Truman laughed as he depressed the button that would allow her to thaw in the warmed space and walked out of the room.
There was only one thing to do now, Laney thought. Pray that Leon could keep Natty and the rest of his boys alive long enough against a virtually unstoppable enemy for her to figure out a way to turn that next-to-impossible-to-kill enemy against Truman.
THIRTY-EIGHT
After descending from the mother ship and tearing into the forest floor like falling meteorites, the smaller ships just laid there quietly, in a pool of their own smoke and embers. But slowly, sensing when the temperature was just right, they opened. One of the egg-shaped pods ended up not too far from Leon and Natty, after the two had gone on their little Easter Egg hunt, apparently with some success.
Natty found it curious that the airlock sound of the capsule opening was made to sound like an egg hatching. The mystery was all but cleared up when the creature inside stepped out. It was a human-hybrid, though more reptilian than human. Granted, if the skull bones were any less faceted, it might have been able to pass for a human in a serpent suit out of one of those low budget horror movies.
“Nah, that’s for our benefit,” Leon said in a hushed tone. “And by how you reacted earlier I’d say you’re playing his game of pure psychological terror just fine.”
Serpent Man phosphoresced, lighting up the darkness, feasting on the insects flocking to him, and later on the bats flocking to the insects.
“Bioengineering!” Natty exclaimed as he observed the sentient serpent’s adaptation. “That explains Truman’s desire to get his hands on Laney.”
Leon had to cover his mouth as the creature's sensitive hearing caused it to turn in the direction of Natty and Leon's position. Its phosphorescence dimmed until it was all but undetectable. Just its eyes staring at them, glowing like lanterns. Then the “lamps” went out. After a few seconds, the serpent man decided to ignore the disturbance, roared, and sped off, disappearing into the forest. From how quickly it was moving, there was nothing wrong with its night vision.
Leon took his palm off Natty's mouth so he could speak. “I can’t believe it took me so long to make the connection.”
“You had your hand in any of this?” Leon said.
“I don't know. Maybe.”
Leon eyed him testily.
“Look, I've been filing patents since I was five years old! You said it yourself, don't expect me to remember every little thing.”
“Every little thing, huh?”
***
Leon and his closest people regrouped later that night in the one spot that seemed to be furthest from all the noise and commotion of a forest under “asteroid” bombardment. The mother ship still dropping eggs. Natty paced, almost delirious from stress. “God, we're all going to die.”
The soldiers found him more amusing than aggravating, and they looked like they could use the comic relief, so Leon made no effort to rein him in.
“Why didn't I see it?” Natty exclaimed, gesturing. “I'm always the first to forecast disaster. I can't believe I'm slipping like this.”
DeWitt listened to Natty's banter absently as he checked his gun for serviceability. “Can we keep him?” he said to Leon. “Like a team mascot. He's cute. I mean that in a non-homoerotic way.”
The dawning. “Where's Laney?” Natty blurted, his hands going wide, his fingers spread.
“As you’ll recall, we put her in a tub of liquid nitrogen to keep her safe,” DeWitt said, continuing to oil his gun. “But the tub got sucked up by the giant robot that got sucked up by the spaceship.” He’d moved on to buffing the gun with a cloth. “All in all, I'm thinking she's in a better spot than we are.”
Hearing the mother ship’s ominous sounds as it patrolled the air, everyone looked up. With the vessel now cloaked, lightning trailed about its shell in a freak-weather-anomaly kind of way. DeWitt said, “Laney is my odds-on favorite for the one person coming out of this alive, even ahead of her twin sister.”
Natty groaned. “That’s not what I meant! I meant, there’s no way she’s still on ice. Not if she’s behind all this. So where is she? Ms. Animal Rights wouldn’t let her playmates go anywhere where she couldn’t keep a protective eye on them. So she must be on the ground somewhere.”
“Not necessarily,” Leon said. “Maybe she can do more from her hibernating state, if what you say about that chip on her forehead is true.”
Natty's eyes popped out staring at Leon. “You're messing with me, right? Why must you guys always mess with the rookie? Seriously, you'd think you'd have outgrown that frat boy shit.” As Leon looked more apologetic, lowering his eyes, Natty said, “Please God, tell me you're messing with me! And you’re actually getting ready to scour these woods for her.”
Leon snapped a clip into place. “We’re not messing with you.”
“Well, thank you very much for exceeding my most paranoid fantasies! That's no small accomplishment!” Natty resumed his pacing and rubbing his hands. “Great! If they’re still holding on to her that could only mean one thing. They're going to turn her into cyber-chick. She'll come back at us firing lasers out her eyes and… and cracking heads between her thighs like those lewd Filipino nut-crackers.”
Cassandra smiled half-heartedly.
DeWitt snapped the sliding chamber of his assault rifle into place. “That's what I said!”
Natty screamed, “You're agreeing with me! What kind of insensitive bastard would agree with me?”
“Sorry, just like to feel a bit touched once in a while myself.”
Natty went back to his fevered pacing, and clicking the button on his ballpoint pen against his forehead, tapping out his own personal SOS to any who would listen. Not that anyone was.
Cassandra made her way to Leon’s side. Spoke in a whisper. “The Goliath-Bots that have no place on this world? The mother ship? Now these sentient serpents that don’t exactly fit any viable ecological niches? You getting the impression we aren’t just fighting for the protection of the Amazon rainforest anymore? That maybe something bigger is at stake here? I thought these were just supposed to be war games. Far less some save the forest campaign that the Ubuku turned it into. And now even that drama doesn’t seem to quite cover it.”
“Keep your knickers on. Whatever’s going on behind the scenes, we’ll get to the bottom of it, or my name isn’t Leon DiSparta.”
She snorted derisively and meandered off to clear her mind in her own way, sharpening her machete on her flint stone.
Natty stepped up to Leon. “What now?!”
Leon thought about it. “Let's go get to know our new enemy a little better, shall we?”
His soldiers gave him a "Damn Straight" nod of approval, clearly preferring offense to defense.
“Really?” Natty said. “Because I was sort of thinking we’d head the other way.”
“I don’t know about the rest of you,” Ajax said, taking point, his rifle at the ready, “but we just defeated a Goliath-Bot army big enough to take over three third world countries, not one, not two, but three. So you’ll forgive me if I’m feeling a little full of myself right now. Compared to that, what are a bunch of damn lizards?”
“Ditto,” Crumley said slipping into position behind Ajax.
“That’s double ditto for me,” DeWitt chimed in, moving to the front of the pack so he could taste a piece of the action first.
Leon grimaced. The muscles in his neck and the rest of his body tensed. Though he held his mouth, the words at the tip of his tongue were: “Pride cometh before the fall.”
ACT 3
NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE
THIRTY-NINE
The Manaus peasant who had sprayed a trail of trees directing the jaguar his way laid in wait for his prize. For his scent markers, he’d borrowed a bottle of Calvin Klein’s Obsession for men cologne from a department store in Manaus. Borrowed as in five-finger discount. He was a peasant; he couldn’t afford the prep work required just to slip in the store for the free sample. He had had to go in undercover as an American tourist, which he first had to roll in an alley for his clothing, wallet, and ID. What money he found was too precious to use on the cologne. But he did use a sliver of it to get access to a shower so he could clean up a bit before putting the man’s clothes on. His makeover had involved a haircut and a shave by a local barber for another sliver of the man’s currency. As for the rest of his plan, he just needed to get close enough to the perfume clerk and feign interest and wait until the saleswoman was distracted.
All that work just to get him where he was now, stooping behind a tree and behind the last scent marker. Not to mention the weeks of follow up work to isolate the trails most frequented by the jaguars, which in turn involved becoming quite the scat and paw print expert. He’d also had to read a book on how to skin the animals whose hides he wished to trade on the black market. And purchase the necessary materials for removing and preserving the skins. Then there was the small matter of the rifle. There went the rest of the American tourist’s
dollars.
All in all, a lot of work. Just so he could sit here in abject terror, praying his reflexes were faster than the jaguar’s.
Sure enough, the creature was skulking up the trail towards him, lured by the scent glands of the civet, a small, nocturnal cat-like creature, whose essence was infused in the perfume. The theory was, the jaguar was just remarking its territory, blasting its scent over the civet’s, whether the jaguar himself even knew what a civet was or not. He sure as hell didn’t. The jaguar must have at least been able to tell it was some kind of cat hunting in his territory.
The Manaus peasant kept the night-vision scope of his rifle locked on target, trying to find the one spot where he’d least damage the hide but would be most likely to kill the animal in one shot. At this angle that meant right between the eyes. He figured if the thing was ever stuffed, that would be a tough area to patch up. He decided he’d bide his time and wait for a shot of the heart, from the side. That meant exposing himself to still more danger by letting the predator get closer. It meant praying the Calvin Klein cologne was strong enough to keep the cat’s attention on its smell and not the peasant’s.
Finally, he saw his chance and took the shot. At the thunder clap of the rifle, the animal immediately went down. Shot straight through the heart, had to be. He’d always been a good shot, although up until today that had most been proven by knocking fruit out of trees with a rock, or beaning old men and women living alone and sitting placidly on their back porches with a stone, so he could get inside their dwellings and rob them blind. This life as an illegal-game hunter and poacher, though not the sexiest of options for supporting himself, was proving to still be a far more laudable lifestyle. He’d actually managed to kill one of those old people that he’d just meant to knock out with the rock. The guilt had led him to his latest occupation.
Mind of a Child: Sentient Serpents (OMEGA FORCE and ALPHA UNIT Book 1) Page 37
