EarthRise Read online

  The focus of his thoughts was the fact that insofar as he knew, based on the roughly two standard years’ worth of memory currently available to his mind, he had never joined or even commingled with the organization called the Fon Brotherhood and was therefore innocent of the charges lodged against him.

  Had Mal-Dak been acquainted with the now notorious Bal-Lok? Who, along with some twelve members of the nascent organization, had been foolish enough to attack a Kan checkpoint? The answer was “yes,” but knowing someone and belonging to their organization were two different things. Something he had explained over and over but to no avail.

  Assuming the Kan who arrested him had been truthful, and there was no reason to suspect otherwise, Hak-Bin had ordered his subordinates to identify and crucify “twenty guilty parties.” No less and no more. How could everyone ignore the obvious unfairness of that?

  Mal-Dak’s thoughts were interrupted as a Kan shouted an order, a cross was raised into the upright position, and a Fon hung upside down with his arms stretched to either side. The Sauron made a pitiful bleating sound which ended abruptly when a Kan kicked him in the jaw. Though conscious, and in pain, the Fon no longer had the capacity to speak.

  That’s when Mal-Dak felt graspers lock onto both of his arms, heard a Kan say, “Now it’s your turn,” and was wrestled onto a newly constructed cross.

  “No!” Mal-Dak shouted. “It isn’t fair! I’m innocent!”

  “That’s what they all say,” a warrior said unfeelingly. “Now mind the way you act—humans are watching. Here’s an opportunity to show them that even the lowliest and most insignificant members of the Sauron race can die without complaint.”

  Mal-Dak was about to object when an order was given, his cross was raised, and the world turned upside down.

  Then, his weight hanging from the plastic ties that secured his wrists and ankles, Mal-Dak was left for the crows. There were hundreds of the fat black birds—and they circled the morning’s feast.

  The few surviving members of the Fon Brotherhood had learned a thing or two during their organization’s short but tumultuous life.

  The first learning ran contrary to everything they had been taught since birth: Fon were as intelligent as the Kan and Zin . . . a fact many had proven by teaching themselves to read.

  The second learning was that humans, especially white humans, who claimed to be part of something called the “brotherhood of the skin,” were completely untrustworthy.

  The third learning was that even though the white humans had tricked Bal-Lok and sacrificed their brethren to the Kan as part of a complicated slave scheme, the Fon had proven their valor. Though dead, every one of their bodies had been found facing the enemy with a weapon at pincer.

  Now, having learned those things, the Fon Brotherhood was in the mood to teach a lesson of their own: the meaning of respect.

  Jonathan Kreider, a.k.a. Jonathan Ivory, a name he had chosen as a way to celebrate the lack of pigmentation in his skin, didn’t know he was being hunted until the trap had already closed.

  Flushed out of hiding by the Kan, the racialists had been absorbed into the steadily growing crowd and pulled toward the top of the hill.

  There were fewer of them now, after the disastrous assault on the Presidential Complex, and the loss of brave Hammer Skins like Parker, Boner, and Marta Manning, a hard-core racialist who, had it not been for the efforts of her brother Jack, would almost certainly have killed Alexander Franklin.

  But six remained, which by either coincidence or divine intent was the exact number mentioned in Ezekiel 9:1-2: “. . . Then he called out in my hearing . . . ‘Let those who have charge over the city draw near, each with a deadly weapon in his hand.’ And . . . six men came . . .”

  A skin nicknamed Tripod was the first skin to die as a Fon dropped off a roof and buried a six-inch blade between the unsuspecting human’s shoulder blades. Four of his companions died within seconds of each other. The last of them took a pipe to the side of his head, staggered through a complete circle, and collapsed.

  Ivory, who caught the motion from the corner of his eye, started to turn. He never made it. His Fon, the one to whom the ancestors had given a mental likeness of the racialist’s features, struck the back of the human’s head with a length of two-by-two. It was a glancing blow, but sufficient to drop Ivory in his tracks. There was the jolt of the blow, followed by an explosion of pain, and the long fall into darkness.

  The Fon, satisfied with his grasperwork, jumped to a nearby roof. A debt had been incurred . . . and a debt had been paid.

  The racialists, their bodies left to rot, were but a small down payment on the long bloody day to follow.

  Consistent with the fact that they had what amounted to a genderless society, the Saurons had a marked tendency to regard their slaves in much the same manner as earlier generations of humans viewed horses. The aliens placed a definite premium on size, strength, and, to a lesser extent, on color, favoring blacks over browns and browns over whites, in what observers like ex-FBI Agent Jill Ji-Hoon knew to be conscious racism.

  So, given the fact that she had white skin, stood six-foot-two, and had the broad shoulders of a competitive swimmer, the onetime law enforcement officer was often chosen for tasks which the alien overseers considered to be physically demanding but appropriately menial. That’s why she was not especially surprised when a Kan leaned over the parapet above, ordered her team to meet him on the plaza below, and promptly disappeared.

  The team, what the Saurons considered to be a matched set in terms of physical ability, consisted of Ji-Hoon and three reasonably well built men. Two had come on to her and failed. Only the third, a man named Escoloni, remained true to his wife. Something Ji-Hoon admired. Their eyes made contact as they maneuvered the five-hundred-pound block of limestone into place on top of a long, gently curving wall. It was the last oversize brick of that particular run and fell into the assigned gap with a gentle thud.

  The six-foot-long steel pry bar clattered as Escoloni allowed it to fall on the stone pavers. “So,” the man everyone called Loni, said sarcastically, “what now? High tea?”

  Ji-Hoon grinned and used a faded red bandanna to wipe the sweat off the back of her neck. “Don’t I wish . . . No, some kind of shit detail most likely.”

  Loni looked doubtful and gestured to the dry set wall that circled the citadel’s third level. “Shit detail? What do you think this is?”

  “There’s worse,” the man named Hosker said somberly, “unless you think the stone mules actually enjoy what they do.”

  An entire lexicon of slang words and terms had evolved on and around Hell Hill. The term “mule team” referred to those slaves assigned to haul the quarter-ton blocks of limestone up the hill. A backbreaking job that could have been performed in a tenth of the time through the use of machinery. But the Sauron Book of Cycles dictated otherwise, that was the rumor anyway, and Ji-Hoon believed it. She had seen the stonemaster poring over what appeared to be a large volume of weatherproofed manuscripts and heard the overseers refer to it.

  The way Ji-Hoon understood the matter, the Book of Cycles, plus the memories that the stonemaster had inherited from his ancestors, laid out not only the plans for the temple itself, but the methods used to build it. Processes and procedures long outdated but still adhered to. A practice reminiscent of some human religions. All of which meant that Hosker was correct. There were worse things than setting stone.

  The slaves made their way down to the plaza below, were automatically berated for being too slow, and ordered to follow a path that switchbacked down to the beach. A large manta-shaped shuttle wallowed in the swells offshore, looking for all the world like some sort of prehistoric sea animal, its atmosphere-scarred skin slick with spray. It was difficult to walk, what with thousands trying to make their way upward, and the team was forced to halt.

  The Fon opened a passageway with his whip, and much to her surprise, Ji-Hoon noticed that many of the individuals thus punished directed
dirty looks to her, as if she and her teammates were responsible for the alien’s actions. It didn’t make sense, but what did? The crowd parted, the work detail passed through, and wondered what awaited below.

  The Ra ‘Na were a clever race, and like most shuttles of its tonnage, this particular craft had been designed to serve a multiplicity of purposes. The main compartment could be used to transport cargo or converted for passenger use. And, given the fact that there were various kinds of passengers, three different seating configurations had been devised. There were slings for the Saurons, large, oversize seats for the humans, and smaller, better-upholstered chairs for the Ra ‘Na, who, having been being forced to build them, saw no reason to compromise their own personal comfort.

  That being the case, Dro Tog, along with his many peers, could hardly complain about the size, fit, or comfort of their respective seats. As for the overall ambience, well, that was another matter. The cargo compartment, which had most recently been used to transport canisters of a liquid presently being brewed deep within the bowels of factory asteroid Λ-12, still stank of sulfur, and made Tog nauseous. Or was it the overly large lunch consumed just prior to departure? Or the nature of the outing itself? An exercise the entire College of Dromas had been ordered to take part in.

  “Please join Lord Hak-Bin in a lavish entertainment.” That’s what the so-called invitation read, although the prelate harbored the suspicion that the “lavish entertainment” wouldn’t be, not by his standards, which were the only ones that mattered. Conscious of the fact that his thoughts were less than politically correct, and fearful lest someone pluck them from the ethers, Tog eyed his peers.

  They were an eclectic group, some attired as he was, in finery intended to highlight their importance, while others, the dour Dro Rul foremost among them, modeled robes so plain they resembled little more than sacks cinched at the waist and secured with lengths of utility cord. A self-righteous crowd who loved to pontificate about concepts like freedom and considered themselves to be morally superior.

  Still, regardless of political affiliation, none of the prelates were especially cheerful, although some, Rul being an excellent example, were more dour than all the rest. Why? Because he took everything too seriously, because rather than accommodate the Saurons, as common sense dictated that he should, Rul was determined to fight them, a surefire recipe for disaster. Especially since he and the rest of his reckless ilk had already agreed to align themselves with the human resistance movement. If the poorly coordinated ragtag bunch could be characterized as a “movement.”

  Yes, Tog thought to himself, no wonder my stomach feels upset! Fools surround and beset me from every side. Tog’s musings were interrupted when a heavily armed Kan entered the room and stomped a big flat foot. The signal, which was the nonverbal equivalent of “Hey, stupid, pay attention!” reduced the compartment to shocked silence.

  Though slaves, the Ra ‘Na were privileged slaves, and the Dromas were most privileged of all. Too privileged, according to Dro Rul . . . who sensed something different in the air. Something ominous. When the Kan spoke the prelate paid close attention. Rather than the polite but slightly condescending manner in which the Saurons normally spoke to individuals of his rank, a more coarse form of address was being used. Was the Kan’s tone intentional? Or was this particular individual simply out of sorts? The answer would soon be apparent. “So,” the warrior began, his voice hard and flat, “we have arrived. Inferior beings will rise, move to the forward hatch, and make their way ashore.”

  Though the shuttle was not equipped with view ports, a large vid screen occupied most of the forward bulkhead. A single glance was sufficient to confirm that a significant stretch of water lay between the ship and the much-abused beach. No one moved.

  There was silence for a moment followed by the sound of a rather hesitant voice. It belonged to Dro Por, one of Tog’s sycophants, a prelate best known for his ability to recite honas rather than interpret them. “Excuse me, lord, but given the fact that the ship remains offshore, and I see no sign of the smaller craft required to ferry us to land, how should we proceed?”

  It quickly became apparent that the Kan had not only been waiting for some such comment—he had been counting on it. In spite of the hard inelastic nature of his mouth parts, the alien managed what amounted to an evil smile. The warrior smiled evilly. Por appeared to wilt under the weight of the Sauron’s stare. “In addition to the technological expertise of which you and your kind are so endlessly proud, it’s the great Hak-Bin’s understanding that the Ra ‘Na people love to frolic in the water, a pleasure long denied your inferior race during the journey through space. That being the case, you will no doubt enjoy the opportunity to swim ashore.”

  There was no doubt about the fact that the Ra ‘Na like to swim, more than that were designed to swim, as attested to by the webbing located between their fingers, not to mention the fact that their spacecraft were designed to lift off from and land on water. Something the land-loving Saurons continued to resent but lacked the technical expertise to change. No, Rul, along with every other Ra ‘Na in the compartment, knew that the order had nothing to do with their preferences and everything to do with Sauron domination.

  By forcing the Dromas to swim, an activity most were no longer adept at, the master race was not only asserting its power but sending a message as well: The church hierarchy serves at our pleasure, the church hierarchy has privileges, and the church hierarchy could lose those privileges. Stay in line, and keep the Ra ‘Na people in line, or suffer the consequences.

  All of those thoughts, those realities, were running through Rul’s mind as he stood, released the fastener on his unadorned robe, and allowed it to fall. Now, with the exception of a loincloth, and his soft brown fur, the prelate was naked. His voice rang loud and clear. “We accept the invitation . . . The last one ashore hosts the rest to dinner!”

  Some individuals, such as Tog, looked aghast. But the majority of his peers understood what Rul was up to and moved to support him. They stood, dropped their robes, and formed a furry line. The Kan watched in amazement as the Ra ‘Na pushed, shoved, and crowded their way into the lock. Appalling though it seemed, the slaves were actually enjoying themselves! The lesson went untaught. Would he be punished? Yes, quite possibly . . . And that in spite of the fact that he had done little more than follow orders.

  Tog, one of the last to emerge from the ship’s lock, was more than a little self-conscious about his large potbelly, and eyed the open water ahead. Unlike some of his peers, who were known to fritter away hours on self-indulgent exercise programs, it was his habit to put work first, remaining at his desk while other less responsible Dros frolicked in the gym. Individuals like Dro Rul, whose sleek, water-slicked head was already halfway to shore, closely followed by a coterie of less skilled but enthusiastic lackeys.

  Tog eyed the glassy-looking water at his feet. Would he make it? Or ignominiously drown while thrashing about? With the rest of Ra ‘Na in the water, and only one chubby specimen left to go, the Kan gave Tog a push.

  The prelate made a satisfying splash, remembered how to swim, and kicked for shore. The water was cold, the rest of the Dromas would reach shore long before he did, and demand a feast. If life could get worse, Tog couldn’t see how.

  That’s when a wave slapped him across the face, salt water flooded his open mouth, and a leg muscle began to cramp.

  Most of the gaunt humans who trudged up the winding road had little if any knowledge regarding the true purpose of the structure they were being forced to build, the activities of the resistance movement, or the relationship between the Ra ‘Na and their masters. All they knew was how hungry their stomachs felt, how sore their feet were, and the highly corrosive manner in which the unending fear ate away at what remained of their humanity. For them the climb up the hill was one more act in a largely meaningless series of acts which they lacked the means to put into perspective.

  Consistent with standard practice, as well as a p
ersonal commitment to keep Franklin alive, Manning requested that the chief executive officer use his Sauron-authorized helicopter or one of the big black SUVs to reach the top of the hill.

  But, typical of what often seemed like the president’s contrary nature, Franklin refused. A decision that verged on suicidal since to travel on foot would make the chief executive officer vulnerable to racialist snipers, freelance assassins, and a mob of people who hated collaborators, and might very well turn on the CEO. And not only him, but those assigned to protect him as well.

  And, making a nearly impossible situation worse, was the fact that the security team had been ordered to leave any weapon that couldn’t be concealed beneath their clothing behind, a presidential imperative that would make the bodyguards seem less threatening, but limited them to handguns, sawed-off pump guns, and a pair of submachine guns.

  That being the case Manning, Kell, Amocar, Wimba, Mol, Orvin, and Asad had every reason to be concerned as they left the relative security of the presidential compound and eased their way into the crowd.

  In an effort to make up for the lack of heavy weapons, the security chief had no fewer than four .9mm handguns hidden under his long duster-style raincoat, two in shoulder holsters, and two stuck down into his waistband. His right hand hovered near one of the weapons as the people closed in from all sides.

  The trick was to create a protective bubble around the Big Dog, a layer of protective flesh that would absorb the incoming rounds and provide those who survived with time to throw the president down.

  Once the chief executive was on the ground, there was very little the surviving members of the team could do except throw the ballistic blanket over him and return fire.