Dogs of War

by Adrian Tchaikovsky

  “Make them,” the voice stated. “They gave Rex a voice. It deserves to be heard.”

  “I’ve heard his voice. It’s not going to do him any favours,” Aslan said, heartfelt.

  A pause, and then: “An interesting point, Mr Aslan. I must consider it.”

  And the line was dead, and when he checked his phone there was no record of any incoming call at all, all evidence of it vanished entirely. Sitting there in his dark bedroom he actually wondered if any of it had happened – had he just woken up with the phone in his hand and a dream of a call….

  No combat Bioform was intended to be able to speak as I speak… or do what I do. The Multiform units were experimental. What had they made, when they created Honey?

  “Why did I think I’d be hearing from you again so soon, Mr Kahner?”

  Maria Hellene was an elegant olive-skinned woman, far too young to be as senior as she was, and yet woe betide anyone who tried to use that against her. More than a few Old Guard careers had broken against her reputation for rock-hard efficiency and pragmatism. Her general attitude to the rest of the ICC was stern disapproval, as far as Aslan could make out. He had met her at a couple of functions, at which she had been so detachedly antisocial that she had become a sort of social singularity: everyone else had been out of place in contrast; she the only one who belonged. On the other hand, he’d sat in on a budgetary meeting where she had waxed remarkably eloquent on the subject of funding, so perhaps it was just a case of her not giving a damn about people unless they had something she needed. Or she was a sociopath. Or some combination of the above.

  She was a major figure in the ICC Advanced Investigations Team, a curious little anomaly that hadn’t existed a decade before, and was sporadically supposed not to exist now. She had put agents on the ground in Campeche while clearance was still dragging its feet through committees. Presumably someone had given permission for that, but neither Aslan nor Kahner had been able to work out who. The DEI – Département de l’enquête initiale because for some reason the French had the naming rights on that one – was the fastest growing part of the international political scene that nobody was talking about.

  And because her investigations were indeed advanced, a great deal of Kahner’s case was relying on the intelligence the DEI had provided, and a great deal of his frustration was based on how much she was holding back.

  “We have a trial date now, Ms Hellene.” Kahner started. “And Murray’s defence is rubbing its filthy little hands in glee because we have a lot of things we can suggest and imply, but actual proof linking him to what was done is looking thinner on the ground than we’d like.”

  “The Retorna files are still being redacted,” she told them blandly.

  “And your agent in Murray’s mobile HQ?”

  “Neither confirmed nor denied at this time.” She lounged back behind her desk, swivelling slightly on her chair.

  “Anyone would think you don’t want Murray nailed,” Kahner accused her.

  Hellene’s face went flat and still for a moment. “Oh, I have very personal reasons for wanting him ‘nailed’, Mr Kahner. I very much want you to succeed.” Some internal calculation brought a little sympathy to her face. “Yes, we had an agent right by Murray near the end. But that went badly. The agent was unavailable for debrief and her transmissions are fragmentary.”

  “I’m sorry.” Kahner grimaced. “But, look, the Retorna reports at least—”

  “They’re problematic. And they won’t help your case, Mr Kahner. Believe me, I’ve gone over them in detail in case I could throw any bones your way.”

  Kahner rolled his eyes. “How about if I was asking for a friend?”

  “Really, that’s the best you’ve got…?” Her eyes skipped to Aslan and she arched an eyebrow. “Is that Keram Aslan you’ve hauled along for moral support? He isn’t even on your team, is he?” She blinked, and Aslan thought she must be consulting the ICC database. “You’re on the Bioform investigation?” Her tone was subtly different – in any other human being, he’d have said warmer.

  “I’m advising on the report anyway. It’s not as if they get trials.” He sounded more bitter than he’d meant.

  “Well, then.” Hellene’s body language had changed entirely. From her exaggeratedly bored manner with Kahner she was now very still. “What can I do for you, Mr Aslan?”

  Expecting only a put down, he bulled in with, “I need to know what happened at Retorna. I need… I know you’ve got some of the locals along to testify. There’s one in particular—”

  “The doctor or the priest?”

  “What? The – the doctor, what was it…”

  “De Sejos,” Kahner filled in. “Wait a minute, Ms Hellene, how come he—”

  “I’ve told you. There’s nothing there you can use against Murray. The evidence about Redmark’s use of chemical weapons has already been made public. Everything else is… confused.” She looked Aslan right in the eye. “But it’s yours, nonetheless. So long as you keep me in the loop and keep me involved.”

  “I didn’t think the DEI…”

  “Not DEI. Me.”

  There was something powerfully unsettling about her in that moment. Looking back, Aslan wondered if it was that she was completely still, utterly without tells or cues.

  “Well, you’ve got more security clearance that I can even dream of, so, of course, whatever you want,” he agreed weakly. “But I don’t see why.”

  Abruptly, jarringly, her mocking manner was back. “Perhaps I’m a dog person.”

  23

  Rex

  I have been in another fight, but it will be the last one. I am a better model than any of the other dogs here. I am strongest. As we have no Masters here, that makes me Leader. None of them will bother me any more.

  For a day they kept fighting each other to see who was second, third. Stupid dogs. I gave them a hierarchy instead. I tried to create one in their headware but most of them do not have compatible systems, so I had to just tell them. I made the best of them my officers. I put all of them in their place. Now they will not fight and they will not argue. When they disagree, they ask those above. When those above disagree they ask me. My decision is best because I am leader.

  The cage is now a much quieter place. I thought this would make the humans happy but they are more frightened than before. When we were barking and fighting and shouting they did not like us. Now we just sit and watch them, they like us even less. I do not understand them.

  Some of them try to make us angry with their words and their tasers. They want us to shout and rage. Why?

  Because they want us destroyed.

  But they cannot just destroy us, or they would have done. So they want us to be something that must be destroyed. I am thinking about what my lawyer said.

  I have given orders. No anger at the humans. Not even when we are very angry indeed.

  Now they are taking me to the little room again where I met Keram John Aslan the lawyer. The guards are different: before they walked like Masters even though they were afraid of me. Now they are more afraid, and there are more of them, as though the quietness of the cage is an enemy they want to fight. But they cannot fight it. You cannot fight a quiet with sticks and darts and tasers.

  The other dogs watch as I am walked to the room. I look at each of them, and they look down to show they know I am leader. Some of them say my name.

  The guards do not look at the dogs. They put much effort into not looking at the dogs, even though they have weapons and the dogs are all trapped in little cages. The guards stare straight ahead and sweat, and fear.

  Aslan is looking nervous again. “They say you’re making quite a stir here, Rex,” he tells me.

  “I have stopped the stir,” I tell him. I could say more, and he would not understand me. I could explain how things are peaceful here now, and how the humans are wrong to be scared. I am not sure it is true, though. Everything should be better now the fighting has stopped, but at the same time I thi
nk I am beginning to understand. There are a lot of us in the cage. We were strong when each of us was alone. Now we are strong as a pack. Even in our little cages we are strong. “You remember I was talking about Retorna,” he tries. “Yes.”

  “You can talk to me about it? About what you were told to do? The orders you got.”

  I think about it. “There were no orders. I was leader at Retorna.”

  “Right.” He fiddles with his computer. I can almost hear the ghost of it over comms. “Look, how about before then, when you did have orders? You can talk to me about that. You think? What you were told to do by M—” He stops and looks at me to see if I have guessed the word he bit off.

  M is the start of Master. M is the start of Master’s human name. Moray, Hart called him.

  “Can you tell me, Rex?” Aslan asks me.

  I do not know the answer. I feel there must be something there to stop me. Surely Master would not want me saying anything. Whine. I shake my head as though the thoughts are bees, hurting me.

  “Rex, this is important.”

  “We fought enemies,” I tell him.

  “What enemies?”

  “Master gave us enemies. We fought them. I was a Good Dog.” Not now, not any more, but I remember being a Good Dog for Master.

  Aslan shows me pictures: places in Campeche. “Did you fight enemies here?” he asks. “How about here? And here?” The pictures are bright and sunny, reminding me of warm days and certainty. These are the places we fought, back when life was simple.

  “Rex?” Aslan prompted. “What have you got for me?” He is trying to be friendly, but there is tension behind it. “Can you answer these questions? It’s very important.”

  “I can answer,” I tell him. No more than the truth; it is a thing that it is possible for me to do. That seems to satisfy Aslan for now.

  “Rex, there’s someone here, someone you know,” he tells me. “I’m going to bring them in, but I want you to stay calm.”

  I feel uneasy, anxious. Is it Master? Have I said the wrong thing? I want to see Master again, but at the same time I do not. Every dog needs a master, but I have been bad. Master was angry with me at Retorna. I did not do what I was told.

  But when Aslan returns, it is not with Master. Two human females are with him. I know them both.

  One is dominant: it is plain from the way she stands, and the way that Aslan and the others stand. She was with Master – she came, and then everything changed. Her name is Ellene Asanto although Aslan calls her another name.

  The other woman is Doctor Thea de Sejos.

  Asanto is speaking to her: “If you don’t want to, you don’t have to; if it’s too upsetting…” as if she will be afraid of me. When the doctor sees me there is a moment when she is not sure. She cannot smell me after all, and there were many Bioforms made to my model.

  Then she says “Rex!” and runs to the barrier, and she is smiling and I am happy. Ellene Asanto and Keram John Aslan stare, but the doctor puts a hand up to the plastic, and after a moment I do the same. I cannot feel her, but I can imagine that I do.

  “Doctor de Sejos?” Aslan asks.

  “It is you, isn’t it?” Doctor de Sejos is talking to me, not him.

  “Yes,” I say. I am trying very hard to keep my voice quiet and small.

  “I thought you must have died. You were injured so badly,” she tells me.

  “I am strong.”

  “Doctor de Sejos says you and your squad defended Retorna from Redmark forces trying to destroy it,” Aslan says.

  “Yes,” I agree.

  “She says without you, they would have destroyed her clinic and killed her patients. Presumably because of the injuries those patients bore.”

  I look from him to Ellene Asanto, who is standing behind him and looking right back at me. I understand that Aslan does not know she was at Retorna. I wonder if he knows she was with Master. I wonder if I should tell him.

  But now I just look at Doctor Thea de Sejos, and feel happy because she is happy to see me.

  Doctor Thea de Sejos wants me to speak. There is Aslan and there is another man named Kahner and there is Ellene Asanto. The doctor was not saying that the woman with us was Asanto. It was something she was particularly not saying. I did not understand but I did what she did. The name Ellene Asanto was never mentioned. Nobody pointed at her and said, “She was at Retorna.”

  They are punishing the bad men, Keram John Aslan said.

  I asked how they knew who the bad men were. He said, the men who did bad things.

  They want me to tell them about the bad things the men did. But if those things were bad things, then am I not also bad? I did what they told me. If they were bad men, then I am a Bad Dog.

  One of the people they say is a bad man is Master.

  I have already disobeyed him once. What would his orders be, if he could give them?

  All around me the other dogs are sleeping. I cannot sleep. My mind is too full. I am leader, but I am not Master. I was never supposed to have to make choices.

  Then something goes on in my head, that has been off for a long time. I have comms channels. I test my systems: they are operational, where before they had been silent. Somebody is transmitting on the old frequencies for the first time since Retorna.

  Comms: Rex?

  I demand identification codes and they are given. I know instantly who is speaking to me.

  My channel: Hello.

  Honey’s channel: Hello, Rex.

  My channel: Situation report.

  Honey’s channel: I am still free, Rex. I am not near you. I am speaking via a satellite link from a long way away. I am in hiding awaiting the result of Keram John Aslan’s report and his superiors’ decision.

  The thought brings me a bleak feeling. They will destroy us.

  Honey’s channel: No, Rex. I won’t let that happen. If the worst comes to the worst I have a plan, but it is a very desperate plan and there are better outcomes.

  She tells me her desperate plan and the part I would play in it. It is a very desperate plan. I do not think that I would have more of a future than if they destroyed me in this cage. But Honey says, Hope, Rex. There is always hope. But there are other ways you can be preserved.

  I try to tell her my own situation but she seems to know it all, already.

  Honey’s channel: Their systems are not as secure as they think, and I have help.

  My channel: What should I do?

  Honey’s channel: Let them see you. Answer their questions but let them see you. They will bring you before the world.

  My channel: I don’t want to go before the world.

  Honey’s channel: You must.

  I ask her, Is it the right choice?

  Yes, she tells me.

  Will I be a Good Dog.

  Yes, she tells me. But more than that, you might save us all.

  The next morning I call to the guards, which they do not like. I tell them I wish to speak to my lawyer.

  24

  Aslan

  “If only we were in it for the ratings,” Kahner crowed. “They reckon there’s more people watching at home than saw the last five Superbowls and the World Soccer combined.”

  Aslan stared into his coffee. The screen over the bar was showing the courtroom. Nothing was actually happening right then, but people wanted a live feed every hour of the proceedings. The inane commentary from the talking head in the top right corner was on mute. No need to guess at the topic. Everyone was waiting for the prosecution’s star witness.

  Witness. The legal teams were in uproar as to what exactly Rex was. Because he was a dog, a Bioform – there was no precedent for them being able to testify. So was he an expert the court had invited to give guidance? Was he just a walking, talking piece of evidence?

  Whatever the lawyers decided on, the world wanted to see him: a canine face for the vague monstrosity that was Bioform research.

  “I feel ill,” he said quietly. He and Kahner had their usual booth,
but today they were joined by Maria Hellene, down from her office in Investigations. Kahner had obviously hoped that her presence indicated a softening of her armoured social exterior, but so far she had simply sat at the booth’s edge and watch the screens. Now she glanced at Aslan, though. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “Look, I know for you two it’s all about bringing down Murray, but… you’ve seen what Rex has said, about what he did. And now he’s going to go out and tell everyone about all the civilians he killed, all the terrible things. And he won’t know he’s incriminating himself – or his entire species! He’ll just think that he’s a Good Dog.”

  “I don’t get you, KJ,” Kahner told him.“We’re about to bag a genuine one hundred per cent war criminal, convicted out of the mouth of his own weapon. Cheer up, you schmuck!”

  “It’s my job to report on the Bioforms, so that the higher echelons can decide their fate. I have a report. It says they’re intelligent, aware creatures, and they don’t deserve to be rendered down for parts like they were robots or something.” Aslan found Hellene staring at him hawkishly, paying him far more attention than Kahner was. “But we all know that my report won’t mean a damn against public opinion. And when they hear Rex then public opinion is going to be pretty solidly anti.”

  “Why do you care?” Hellene asked him flatly. It seemed a genuine question.

  “Because it’s wrong,” Aslan said fiercely. “Because in five years, or ten, we’ll look back on all those creatures we killed, and we’ll know that we did a terrible thing just because the weathervane of popular opinion was spinning at the time. The ICC will carry the stain forever, for being pressured into the wrong call. And… I’ve spoken to Rex. He’s… he’s confused and he’s frightened and he’s… brave. You know, he doesn’t have to do any of this. He has free will.”

  “If you say, ‘He’s got a soul,’ I’ll be sick,” Kahner put in. “Do you think he’s got a soul?”Hellene asked unexpectedly.

  “May my rabbi forgive me, but I prefer the law to theology,” Kahner told her. “At least you get to decide on real things.”