The 6th of Six (The Legend of Kimraig Llu) (10 page)

“You failed to kill that Hunter Kimraig! You used my assignation teams and failed! What good are you? Answer me!” she spat, sweating heavily now. Her tirade could have been fearsome if her gaze had locked on either Charles in front of her, or Marvin off to her left. No, instead, her darting glances flicked from the ceiling above, or the walls around her, and the floor below. All of these held more appeal then meeting either male eye to eye.

Charles stretched his toothpick arms above his head as he rolled his eyes toward his partner, who simply observed. As the tirade continued, Marvin folded his massive arms across his chest, his wide face blank, distant.

“Well, let me see,” Charles answered, smoothing the crease in his freshly pressed trousers. “We were good enough to prevent a useless assault by your teams, an assault you ordered, an assault down a narrow hallway against two capable Hunters guarding a Leader’s door.”

And in so doing, we earned the everlasting gratitude of every man on those assignation teams, plus my own ready-made army that chose my side over yours.
At the thought, Charles found a bit of lint on his trousers.

“Besides,” he continued, “waiting always provides opportunities.”

Charles would not hide his contempt for this thing before him. Her very presence stained Marvin’s masterful depiction of a cloudy twilight sky etched on the ceiling above. She cast a funereal pall over the white washed walls with their faint hints of lush green fields and blue seascapes.

“No! We had both him and that Leader Breen right there, waiting for plucking. You let it pass!” Geri-5 found it difficult to leverage more of her body over the desk—just a bit short on one end. Her oily face blotched with mottled scarlet, her rage consuming her.

“Ah, now I see,” Charles chuckled. “You were hoping to dispose of our new Leader as well. That leads me to believe you considered yourself for that honor.”

“As Queen, I held number one position for promotion to Leader. Breen-2 took the credit, using my victory at the train station as her own.”

Good trick Geri, you moved from rage to defense in a blink of an eye: strange. I think now I have your attention!

He looked her directly in the eye as he smoothed a trouser crease.

“Geri my dear, you might have been number one if you had killed Breen and Kimraig that day. You were lucky when you turned on your Leaders; he was about to murder you as well.” Charles knew he would not lose her now. A casual flip of a finger at a nonexistent itch on the bridge of his nose moved Marvin close behind her.

“Wrong!” She said, as the events replayed rapidly past the blocks she had set to keep them buried deep inside.

* * *

The conspiracy against her started before her Mating Ritual. She had been simply “Geri” then. She was Geri nothing. She was Geri without a building number. More importantly, the Mating Ritual was the key to that number. She had to mate before her sixteenth birthday—in one week. There would be no number attached to her name after that.

Technically, her entire sixteenth year counted. But after her actual sixteenth birthday, the Leaders required strict records on all who waited. Every measly morsel of her life would appear in anal script. Any juicy tidbits, like her two failed attempts to complete the coupling, would appear in lurid detail. Success, even on the last day of her fifteenth year, would show only as a checked box titled, “Completed, 15th Year.”

Following the advice of her Gender Leader, Geri chose Kimraig for her coupling. He produced more male children than all the other consorts; her Leaders were playing the odds. Geri, with Kimraig’s sperm could increase the chance a male child would be her issue. The Gender genes also passed from female parent to son, a future hero for their cause.

The child would be Other, a male who preferred other males as she preferred other females. Kimraig refused her with no explanation.

The younger females in her training class, offered their own whispered version. They spun their tale repeatedly, always behind cupped hands held to many eager ears. A friendly hand at her ear explained his refusal: Kimraig had sensed her preference for women. Geri did not get the point. He had thrown himself at Viral-1, his Queen. It made little difference to Geri that all Hunters did whatever their Queens might demand.

He had said yes to that bitch Breen. Geri would never forgive him.

Choosing from the least offensive of the remaining escorts, she tried again. Only by fantasizing about the child-woman Kylie, who shared her bed, could she produce enough lubricant to endure the nasty coupling. She produced a male child; a bright pink, piggy, little gnome of a thing that lasted just ten days. Had she taken him to her breast, he might have lived. Maybe just a name would have helped. The records were complete—Queen in training Geri-5. To hell with the Leaders, she needed nothing more.

Her combat training almost cost her that coveted number. She could not lead. She only knew how to use bluster and physical abuse to force her orders. Her lack of command skills during each mock battle continued to disgrace her. Where caution screamed, she attacked. When attack would win battles, she withdrew. It made little difference. Chosen by her radical Leaders, her selection as Queen came in the first round.

Geri was not dense. She sensed another reason for her selection.

Geri was also observant. She would look, listen, wait and then take charge.

Finally, it was Graduation Day!

By design, two Wicca Leaders who had secretly committed to the lifestyle of the Others, had chosen this day to murder the remaining Wicca Leaders and install themselves as sole government of the Builders. During the two-year training of the ten groups, these two Leaders carefully selected Queens and Troopers who were dedicated only to them and the blue and gold crossed lightning bolts. The Hunters followed their Queens. They had selected another Queen, Geri-5. She had not earned the number 5. The renegade Leaders added that to save themselves embarrassment.

Viril-1, the Queen whose Battle Group stood out the most in the six groups would make sure Geri-5 did her job. They were off to the right, supposedly to stop fights, but instead were the second prong of the attack.

Their revolution would start under the guise of a mock training exercise scheduled on the concourse in the old train station. This large underground area contained only a few pillars to support the roof. Here they could depend on light for most of the day. The sun blasted through old skylights with fractured glass, protected by steel supports and mesh to catch broken window pieces. Power from solar panels was on standby to feed the lighting system if necessary.

Maintenance crews had long since sealed the entrance and exit tunnels to block the bad air and most of the water filtering down after heavy rains. Afterwards they filled in the train tracks to fashion a mostly flat training quad three hundred yards long and two hundred yards wide.

Ten Battle Groups, one hundred and thirty students, would form in this cavernous space. Each group numbered an even dozen plus one Queen, including two male Hunters, and ten female Troopers. This was their first time in a full-scale live training exercise.

Four groups, with yellow plumes on their battle helmets, would protect the Wicca Council and its thirteen Leaders, who were watching from the large flat landing above the steps leading to the entrance doors of Number 2 Building. Four more groups, with green plumes, stood facing the steps less the one hundred yards further out on the training quad. They would attack the yellow force guarding the Wicca.

Each side kept a single Battle Group in reserve to break up fights started by overzealous troops. Their helmet plume colors were peacekeeper orange. They stood twenty yards away facing the path the attack force would follow. These older, more experienced troops would keep the peace.

Except Geri-5 who was not older or more experienced. The Leaders who had mistakenly championed her were forced to save Geri from herself; they buried her where another Queen could watch her. She was so inept; her experienced Hunters had to remind her to replenish the water in her personal canteen.

It was time, let the battle begin.

Two of the four Battle Groups with green plumes began the mock attack. After these groups had advanced ten paces, the remaining two groups followed. Hidden in the back of each set of two groups was one extra member, they thought that extra member would be undetectable from a full frontal view. The red battle helmet of a Leader gleamed from that spot. As subtle as it seemed, this was their first mistake.

Inexperienced but alert, Breen-3 stood at the back of her Battle Group, up on the first step leading up to Number 2 Building. Of their three additional yellow plumed groups, one was beside her group, two more in front of each of them. The Wicca watched the Graduation Ceremonies from the landing above. Looking over the yellow plums of her groups, Breen-3 noticed quick flashes of red from two groups marching toward her.

Red meant Leaders,
she thought.
There were no Leaders in training groups. I saw them behind me, on the steps watching the graduation battle.

The ominous cadence of fifty plus booted troops shook the broken glass in the skylights and chipped gray dust from the concave ceiling.

Breen-3 turned and ran up the four steps towards the Wicca. Her two Hunters followed. A quick count found only eleven Leaders on the stairs. Two were gone. Looking back over her Battle Group, she verified two red helmets leading two groups each. Breen-3 remained unsure of why two Leaders were missing, but was taking no chances with the lives of the remaining eleven women under her protection.

Quickly, as if she had done this before, Breen-3 assigned her personal Hunters to secure the eleven women inside Number 2 Building. She issued orders to her Hunters to kill anyone who entered, then waited to hear the doors lock behind them. For a mock exercise, the order seemed strange to her Hunters but they had no doubt of her meaning.

The Leaders in red made their second mistake. They ordered their groups to throw their spears in volleys. Each group carried steel tipped spears, instead of flat harmless training models, and they launched them from each of the four advancing groups. The spears trajectory had to remain low to clear the train station ceiling. With the Wicca behind closed doors, they would need more than one battle to get to them.

But they had thrown too soon. The distance blunted the devastation each volley would have caused if they had been closer.

Breen-3 had not registered the sound of battle only the playing of it in front of her. As the spears were in the air, she issued her first combat order. “Up shields: on my mark.”
Wait for the right moment.
“Now!”

Only a few, in the other three groups, thought to respond to a Queen other than their own.

Although the distance had been misjudged, the damage was bad enough. The solid thump of spears piercing flesh was the first sound of real battle these trainees had heard. Three Queens in Breen-3’s group went down in that first volley. Half the Hunters also as they tried to carry their Queens to safety. Blood ran and sought the lowest level, pooling where the railroads once ran. At first the odor was that of new steel, turning almost too quickly to that of fermenting fish.

Sound came pouring in, thinking almost impossible, reactions slow.

Since they had been expecting harmless training spears, the shields were slow to form a screen. Deflected steel found soft flesh. Screams after flesh was torn, oaths as falling bodies knocked troopers down. One took the yellow plume from Breen-2’s helmet. Shafts, glanced off the ceiling, to come chattering along the concrete floor to enter the tightly packed ranks at ankle level.

She gave her Troopers no time to think. The remaining Hunters seemed too shocked to react. “All ranks prepare to launch. Front ranks launch spears: on my mark.”
Judge the flight time carefully.
“Now!”

Their return volley took flight.

“Front ranks to the steps, replace your spears with those steel tipped shafts.” Very calm, very warm, she felt molten resolve course through her body. Sensing leadership, other Troopers rallied to the steps.

Waiting for a beat as the ranks shifted, she cried again. “Second volley ready. Launch spears on my mark.”
Wait for them to march a little closer.
“Now!” Their second volley took flight, a few spears steel tipped.

There was no time to rest.

“Up shields on my mark; now!”

They all registered the sparks from steel tips grazing the ceiling, not nearly as many this time. Their own harmless training spears, correctly aimed to take advantage of the concave roof, had disrupted the enemy’s ranks. Even so, the solid thud of spears echoed with the screams as more Troopers fell to the spears.

“Quickly. Withdraw to the second row of steps. Now.” The troops reacted to their training.

“Up shields...”
Wait for it.
“Now.”

She waited for the shields to snap into place before she spoke. “Good, we have some protection from those spears skidding into our toes. We do not need another mess.” She did not get the laugh she had hoped for, but at least two troopers relaxed enough to smile.