Chapter 3: Snare

“We’re coming up on the signal now,” Xipa warned, the group stopping in the shadow of a towering building that pierced the clouds. Its ornate facade was carpeted in red moss, all of its windows broken, its off-white carbcrete giving it the appearance of some long-dead thing. Ahead of them, the streets converged on the city center, an open park area that covered maybe five or six thousand square meters. Just like what they had encountered in the prior bands, the plants here had overgrown their bounds, creating a thriving forest that spilled out to tear up the asphalt. Rising up from the dense canopy in the center was a sculpture of glass and steel, twisting into the air to form a giant seed. Most of the panels were broken now, but Xipa could still make out the way that they transitioned from blue to green, refracting the light to create a border between earth and sky.

“I don’t know about this,” Fletcher muttered, shielding his eyes from the sun as he glanced up at the tall buildings that surrounded them. “If I was going to stage an ambush, I’d do it here. There are a million windows that have a perfect view of the park. Someone could be standing on a roof with a fucking rocket launcher, and we wouldn’t even be able to see them from down here.”

“The transmitter is right in the middle,” Xipa replied. “We have little choice but to proceed.”

“Maybe I could take a look,” Bluejay added.

“If you’re going to do it, do it quietly, Jay,” Fletcher replied. Bluejay blinked back at him, taken aback by how he was being addressed now. “The last thing we need is you getting shot out of the sky.”

“Full-spectrum scan,” Bluejay suggested. “Infrared, FLIR, motion detection.”

Fletcher nodded, then began to raise his rifle, flinching away from Ruza as the feline tried to put a furry hand on the barrel.

“Calm down, you fleabag. I’m not gonna fire it.”

The team began to look through their scopes and visors, scanning the trees ahead and the windows that towered above them. Xipa switched to her visor’s heat mode, the world taking on shades of black and blue, increasing the magnification as she scanned the windows across the park. Nothing stood out to her, but she couldn’t check every damned window in the square. After a few minutes, they stopped, Xipa glancing to her companions from atop Gustave’s shoulder.

“I got nothing,” Fletcher announced. “Anyone?” Everyone shook their heads, and he sighed into his helmet. “There are too many places that a critter could hide. That sniper Bug didn’t even put out any body heat when it was stalking us. We’d never be able to pick it up at any kind of distance.”

“Let me lead the way,” Bluejay suggested, gesturing to his antennae. “I should be able to sniff out any ferals before they get into visual range. Not the snipers, obviously.”

“Watch yourself,” Fletcher replied, giving him a pat on the back. “I want everyone keeping their distance. Should make it harder for a boobytrap or an explosive to catch us all at once.”

They formed a loose wedge with Bluejay at its tip, Xipa hopping down from Gustave’s shoulder as they advanced, the team staying maybe five meters apart. Tension melded with her excitement. They were so close to their destination, but this was easily the most dangerous leg of their journey. There were almost certainly Bugs still inside the city walls, and they’d all be heading here.

She shouldered her XMR, sweeping it back and forth as she bobbed through the bushes, the red leaves rustling beneath her clawed feet. Gustave was off to her right, his massive cannon at the ready, while Fletcher walked to her left. He was unarmed, apparently heeding Ruza’s orders despite how naked it must have made him feel.

They pushed through the dense trees, the sculpture rising up in front of them as they neared the absolute center of the city.

“What is the purpose of this structure?” Ruza wondered, breaking comms silence.

“Decorative,” Xipa replied. “It’s supposed to represent the seed from which the city would grow.”

“Quiet,” Fletcher hissed. “Jay, anything?”

“Just plants and animals so far,” the insect replied. “There’s a lot of pollen in the air, lots of mushroom spores. Makes it a little harder to get a read.”

“There!” Xipa exclaimed, pointing towards the sculpture. “I see the beacon!”

Above the canopy was a small, yellow device – a box about the size of an MRE with rounded corners and a little black antenna. It had been attached to one of the structure’s exposed supports with what looked like electrical tape. A cable trailed from it, spiraling its way down the metal beam, taped in places to keep it from coming loose. It vanished from view inside the sculpture, Xipa hurrying closer as Fletcher extended a hand to stop her in vain. When she peeked through an opening that had once held a pane of glass, she saw that the insulated cable was connected to an emergency generator that was sitting in the middle of the mushroom-covered floor. She could hear it chugging along. It was an old portable model that ran on biofuel, intended to be used in areas where there was no electrical grid.

“I knew it!” she chirped, turning to glance back at the rest of the team as they closed in to get a look. “Someone jury-rigged this beacon to keep broadcasting!”

“What does that mean?” Fletcher asked, following the winding cable with his eyes.

“Don’t you see?” she demanded, practically hopping on the spot with excitement. “The beacon is positioned above the canopy! These trees weren’t here at the time of the invasion! That generator runs on biofuel – it couldn’t possibly have been left unattended for more than a few days. Someone has been coming here to refill it!”

Something landed in the tall grass at Bluejay’s feet, rolling to a stop.

“Grenade!” Fletcher yelled, the device exploding before they had a chance to react. A cloud of noxious gas erupted into the air, quickly carpeting the area in an obscuring shroud. It looked like a Bug gas grenade, Xipa leaping away from the swirling haze. Everyone had been wearing their helmets with the visors down save for Gustave and Bluejay. The reptile was already pulling his hood over his long snout, but Bluejay was writhing, clawing at his face with both pairs of hands as he stumbled backwards. He flailed, whipping around like he was swiping at invisible flies, his eyes wide and unfocused.

A far-off shot rang out, a sticky web expanding to coat the Jarilan in its shimmering strands, quickly tangling the disoriented insect’s limbs. He toppled over, still squirming in the grass. As Xipa spun around, aiming her gun at the source of the shot, she realized that they were surrounded.

All around the team, concealed hatches were opening up, the wooden panels covered over with grass. Figures cloaked in red foliage rose up from the dugouts beneath to aim weapons at them, Xipa catching glimpses of molded resin and shining magnetic rails. These were not Bugs, however. From beneath a cowl that was sewn with autumn leaves, she saw the green snout of a Valbara’nay.

There must have been two dozen of them, the team taken completely by surprise. Ruza slowly set his XMR on the ground, Xipa and Fletcher following suit, the barrels of the strange weapons following their every movement. They raised their hands above their heads, Fletcher glancing over at Gustave, who still had his cannon raised.

“Put that thing down, you oversized iguana!” he hissed under his breath. “You’re gonna get us all killed!”

Gustave seemed to consider for a moment, then gradually lowered the enormous weapon to the ground, raising his leathery hands in surrender. It was still attached to the drum magazine on his back via the ammo belt, but the gesture was enough to stop them from being ventilated on the spot. Their captors were climbing out of their dugouts now, their bobbing gait and their long tails confirming Xipa’s suspicions. Even with so many guns pointed at her, she couldn’t help but feel a flutter of relief and pride. She was vindicated.

“I hate being wrong,” Fletcher muttered as one of the survivors raised the magnetic rails of a Bug rifle to his face.

One of the strangers approached Xipa, the long cloak that she wore trailing on the ground behind her. Now that she could get a closer look, she saw how red leaves and mosses had been sewn into the fabric for camouflage, not dissimilar from how the sniper Bugs used their silk to blend into their environment. Beneath a shadowy cowl, Xipa could make out the end of a gas mask, a pair of large, square filters hanging off the snout. As the stranger pulled the hood back, she saw that it was a mask of the kind used by the City Guard when tackling fires, designed to filter out smoke and dangerous chemicals. The transparent visor was scratched in places, worn by use, but Xipa could see the wearer’s violet eyes peering back at her.

In the woman’s hand was a Bug plasma pistol, an amalgam of camouflaged resin and organic components, the magnetic rails shining in the dappled light that made it through the canopy. She pointed it at Xipa, who tried not to flinch away, keeping her sheaths under control.

The rest of the survivors had closed in, keeping the team in their sights, scrutinizing the strange aliens. Bluejay was only now recovering from whatever had been done to him, lying still as one of the camouflaged women approached him, his eyes tracking her warily. From beneath her cloak, she drew a savage weapon, a one-handed hammer of the kind one might have expected to find on a construction site. She wielded it like a pick, raising it above her head with the claw facing the ground, preparing to bring it down on Bluejay’s skull.

“Wait!” Xipa demanded, her suit panels flashing orange in alarm.

The masked woman raised a gloved hand, the feather sheath on her forearm fanning out in a wordless signal for her companion to halt. The hammer-wielding woman paused, waiting patiently for further instructions, Bluejay closing his eyes in silent relief. Xipa turned her eye back to the masked woman, slowly moving her hand to the visor release on the side of her helmet. When nobody told her to stop, she popped it open, grimacing as she caught a foul whiff of whatever they had hit Bluejay with.

“We heard your distress signal,” she insisted, watching the woman’s eyes play across her burns curiously. “We’re here to rescue you.” A flutter of amused lime passed through the woman’s exposed feathers. Apparently, she wasn’t impressed by her saviors. “A lot has happened since the invasion,” Xipa continued. “I have a lot to explain, but I can’t help you if you kill my flock.”

“Your flock?” the woman scoffed, her voice muffled by her mask. “What about the mealworm?”

“The insect?” Xipa asked, glancing over at the bound Jarilan. A half-truth would be more expedient than arguing for his personhood right now. “It is domesticated – a tool that helps us sense the enemy’s pheromones. It answers to me.”

“Unless you have a leash for your pet, it stays bound,” the stranger hissed. “If we find that it is poorly trained, perhaps we will boil it and serve it for supper.”

“You want to tell the rest of us what all those angry parrot noises mean?” Fletcher asked, one of the women jabbing him in the ribs with the pronged barrel of her Betelgeusian rifle.

“I’m trying to convince them not to eat you,” Xipa replied, keeping her unblinking eye on the masked woman. The stranger cocked her head at the sound, having never heard the Earth’nay tongue before.

“Oh, great,” he grunted as he resisted the urge to rub his side. “Lovely welcome party, by the way. Tell them that I appreciate their hospitality.”

“Shut up!” Xipa hissed.

“You will come with us,” the woman announced, giving another wordless signal with her feathers. Her companions began to force the team to move out at gunpoint, two of them gripping Bluejay by his legs, dragging him through the undergrowth like a sack of fertilizer. More of them retrieved the XMRs from the ground, pausing to relieve the team of their sidearms, confiscating everything that they could recognize as a weapon. They turned the strange guns over in their hands, inspecting the unfamiliar devices before stowing them beneath their cloaks. Gustave was surrounded by half a dozen of the cloaked Valabara’nay, who were all pointing rifles at him, the comparatively tiny creatures not sure what to do with the towering beast. Fortunately for them, he went peacefully, lifting his cannon by the barrel. They had little choice but to let him carry it, as even a whole flock wouldn’t have been able to move the thing.

They knew exactly where they were going, heading off into the park, the masked woman keeping her pistol trained on Xipa as they marched through the trees. Even as they walked, more hidden Valbara’nay revealed themselves, invisible in the foliage until they chose to move. More and more, they reminded her of her people’s distant past. They signaled silently to one another with their feathers, a tradition that still saw use in modern Commando units as a faster alternative to radio while in visual range, and they scaled trees just as their hunter-gatherer ancestors had done to avoid predation. This time, they weren’t hiding from animals, but Bugs.

She caught glimpses of their clothing beneath their capes as they moved. A few were wearing old guard uniforms, the precursors to the pressure suits now used by Commandos. None of them were intact, holes and burn marks covered up with patches and slapdash repairs. They were old, maybe as old as the occupation. Had they been maintaining them all this time?

Others wore a mishmash of civilian clothes and makeshift armor with thick padding that likely served as a kind of stab vest to ward off Bug daggers. There had been no military armor at the time of the invasion – no ceramic plates that might dissipate the heat from a plasma bolt like the ones used today. Some had guard helmets as part of their suits, many of them with cracked or damaged visors that had been crudely patched with sealant, others sporting all manner of gas masks and respirators. There were masks used by welders and construction workers, industrial cleaners, even a mask from what looked like a clean suit – anything that might stand some chance of warding off Bug chemical weapons. Those that had bright colors or identifying markings had been painted over in shades of autumn to match their camouflage.

They wore hand-crafted rigs and bandoleers from which spare ammunition and tools dangled. They each had some kind of melee weapon hanging from a loop on their hip, not the traditional knives, but claw hammers and cruel blades that were shaped like needles to better penetrate stubborn carapaces. Xipa marveled again at the diversity of their weapons. Many were wielding guns of insect design that must have been claimed from their enemies – easily identifiable by their organic components. Curious. Neither the Valbara’nay nor the UNN had ever successfully maintained captured Bug technology for any length of time. Their weapons were alive, and they quickly died in captivity without proper care. Many of the strangers had spare plasma canisters, which suggested that they could keep them working long enough to be reloaded, at least. There was even one woman holding one of the long, unwieldy rifles used by the snipers, which explained how they had been able to fire the net at Bluejay.

Others were wielding laser rifles – old models with integrated backpacks, the same kind that Xipa remembered using on the day of the attack. They were just as old and as scuffed as the rest of their gear, the trailing cables repaired with electrical tape where the insulation had worn away. It was a miracle that the batteries still held a charge.

When Xipa had imagined survivors, they had taken the form of frightened flocks subsisting in hiding, not as an armed force that prepared ambushes. How many Bug squads had they taken out to arm themselves so? The scene that Bluejay had happened upon back in the restaurant – that must have been their doing too. How had they stayed hidden all this time? More importantly, how had they escaped the wrath of the occupying Bugs?

Their captors led them through the ruined city, weaving through rubble-strewn streets and patches of wild forest. They came to a stop beside a collapsed building that had fallen over a road, blocking it entirely with debris, fragments of carbcrete and bent support beams scattered everywhere. The ever-present plant life had colonized it, mosses and lichens not able to distinguish the wreckage from boulders, trees taking root in the exposed soil where the massive fragments had shattered the asphalt.

Two of the women moved ahead of the procession, weaving between the massive pieces of carbcrete. They crouched, gripping rope handholds on the ground, Xipa watching as they dragged a wooden panel aside with some difficulty. It was covered in red mosses and plants, camouflaged so well that she’d had no idea it was there. Beneath it was a large hole in the street where it had given way beneath the weight of the building, leaving a gaping opening wide enough to swallow a good-sized truck. It wasn’t unlike the sinkhole that had nearly claimed Ruza’s life.

Xipa felt the prongs of a handgun against her back as the masked woman urged her forward, pushing her to the edge of the precipice as though intending to throw her off. As she looked down into the sinkhole, Xipa saw the exposed maintenance tunnels and broken water pipes, along with the open sewer below. Unlike the tunnels at the edge of the city, where everything had flooded, this sewer was dry. She could see the smooth stonework, a small trickle of dark water trailing out of view beneath the street. Someone had rigged up ropes that led down into the shadowy depths, knotted for climbing. The two women at the front of the group shimmied down into the tunnel, aiming their weapons up to keep a bead on those who would follow.

“We go down,” the woman hissed in her ear, giving her another push. Xipa crouched, taking the rope in her gloved hands, using the knots as footholds as she lowered herself into the sewer. When she reached the bottom, she felt cold water and wet stone beneath her feet, standing aside to clear the way as her captors eyed her suspiciously. Next came Bluejay, the survivors lowering him down into the tunnel via another rope, still cocooned in the sticky web. It was covered in leaves and twigs that it had accumulated while being dragged around, the expression on Bluejay’s face one of annoyed resignation.

More of the Valbara’nay descended, then came Ruza and Fletcher, the feline holding the dangling Earth’nay by his rig so as not to put any strain on his arms. The rope wasn’t going to hold Gustave, Xipa watching as he peeked his long snout over the edge of the hole.

“Gustave must leap,” he announced, the tinny sounds of his translator drawing curious looks from their new friends.

“Clear the tunnel,” Xipa warned. “He’s going to jump down.”

The survivors did as she asked, aiming their weapons where he was going to land, still wary. With a shower of dust and small pieces of debris, Gustave came crashing into the sewer, having apparently dug his claws into the side of the sinkhole to help slow himself. There was an impact powerful enough to shake the ground beneath their feet, more dust raining from the curved ceiling above their heads. He shook his leathery hide, sending errant pebbles bouncing along the smooth floor, the cloaked figures sharing alarmed glances beneath their masks. What must they think of Gustave, having never seen a Krell’nay before? He was like an ancient legend brought to life. They didn’t know it yet, but if he had wanted to clear the tunnel, they would have been able to do very little to stop him.

“This way,” the masked woman said, gesturing down the dark passageway. Xipa glanced up to see two survivors pulling the wooden cover back into place over the sinkhole, plunging them into darkness. The pair must have another way of getting underground. If these people were using the sewer system to get around, as Xipa was starting to suspect, there could be entrances all over the city.

They began to walk, their feet splashing in the shallow stream of water, their footsteps echoing down the tunnel. Its circumference was just large enough that Gustave could walk without having to duck. They ignited flashlights, illuminating the darkness, Xipa sweeping the beam from her helmet around as she examined her surroundings. When the city had been thriving, the sewage of thousands of buildings would have come rushing through here, but it was completely empty now.

They reached a junction and took a left, Xipa noting that there were objects on the tunnel floor ahead of them. It was some kind of supply cache, crates and old containers that had been stacked one on top of the other. They were sitting on top of crudely fashioned wooden supports that followed the curve of the walls to create level platforms, lifting them clear of the trickling water. As they passed between them, she spotted wooden boxes full of spare plasma canisters and battery packs, along with what looked like canteens and jars of preserved food that were partially covered over by tarps. Perhaps they had caches like this near all of the entrances to the sewers. There was nothing slapdash about this – those platforms had been built to be used long-term.

The path that they took was winding and circuitous, the survivors leading them down side passages and around cave-ins that blocked the tunnels with rubble. The sewers and storm drains ran for kilometers beneath the city, and who knew how many had become damaged or flooded in the time since the invasion. It wasn’t just sewers, either. Their path eventually intersected with maintenance tunnels that housed the city’s power delivery system, plumbing, and information network. These passages were large enough for a whole flock of engineers and a small motorized cart to pass through, making them ideal for underground travel. Unlike the stained carbcrete of the sanitation system, the maintenance tunnels were whitewashed, cables and valves glimpsed through exposed access panels as the group passed them by.

“How are they even finding their way around down here?” Fletcher muttered, daring to whisper to Xipa. “It’s a fucking maze – it all looks the same.”

“A Valbara’nay would only need to be shown the path once to remember it,” Xipa explained. “They probably have the entire layout of these tunnels mapped. No documents can fall into enemy hands if you commit them to memory.”

“Does the same goes for you, too?” Fletcher added as he leaned in conspiratorially. “I get the feeling we might need to make a quick exit if your new friends don’t change their tune once they realize that we’re here to save their sorry arses.”

“They must have been the ones who set up the distress beacon,” Xipa replied. “I’m sure they’ll come around once I explain who and what you are.”

“Forgive me if I don’t give them the benefit of the doubt,” Fletcher grumbled, straightening up again as one of the women gave him an encouraging jab with the barrel of her gun.

“You needn’t whisper,” Xipa added with a sigh. “They don’t speak English.”

“They will soon if the rest of you are anything to go by,” he continued as he turned to glare at his captor.

They descended deeper, following the service tunnels far below the foundations of the city. They eventually came upon a closed door that was guarded by a pair of cloaked figures, the two exchanging alarmed glances as they saw the odd procession approach. They half-raised their rifles at the sight of the aliens, but lowered them again when the masked woman signaled to them with her feathers. They seemed to know her, stepping aside to let the group pass by, one of them pulling the unpowered door open for them on its creaking hinges.

Xipa followed her captor out onto a raised platform, the sight before her taking her breath away. She was standing on a catwalk that overlooked an expansive room, as large as a factory floor. Below her were two dozen massive vats that were partially filled with water. It took her a moment to realize what she was looking at. This was the city’s wastewater treatment plant, an underground facility that connected to all of the sewers where the water was processed and recycled for later use. These round vats were the clarifiers that would once have held sewage, the lids and gas outlet systems that would once have covered them now removed.

The clarifiers were maybe five meters deep and thirty meters wide, the central columns around which the skimmer blades had once turned now repurposed. Branching off of each one was a series of a dozen tall shelves, which were long enough to reach the edge of the vat, and perhaps six meters high. They were vertical farms, plant life overflowing from them, creating walls of red and orange foliage that trailed down into the water below. UV lights mounted on tall stands that sat atop the central pillars fed them, long, insulated cables that were patched with electrical tape trailing off out of view. At least parts of the facility seemed to have power.

As she looked closer, Xipa noticed movement beneath the algae-covered surface of the water, seeing the silvery shimmer of a shoal of fish. These weren’t just farms – they were aquaponic farms, where the nutrient-rich aquaculture water was fed directly to the plants that grew in the vertical racks. Rather than use expansive fields to grow food and graze livestock as some other species did, the Valbara’nay did most of their farming in the industrial band of the city. Many of the 200-meter-tall structures housed hydroponics, aquaponics, and insect farms that produced the fruits and vegetables, fish, and insect protein that made up the bulk of the Valbara’nay diet. It allowed them to grow a lot of food in a very limited space and to minimize their impact on the local ecosystem.

The survivors must have raided those old farms for supplies, recreating them deep beneath the surface, out of view of the Bugs. The insects had no use for such things, so they would have been able to scavenge everything from ultraviolet bulbs to pumps and piping.

There were more survivors down there, too. They walked between the vats, checking on the systems, tending to the crops. There was a whole civilization living right under the noses of the Bugs. How were they generating power, and how were they reducing their emissions and waste enough to avoid drawing unwanted attention? An operation of this scale couldn’t have been set up overnight – they must have been surviving down here for rotations.

“You can admire our farms later,” the woman chided, leading Xipa down the left side of the catwalk. She heard Fletcher whistle in surprise as he walked through the doorway, the sound drawing the attention of a few of the farmers below, who paused to stare at the strange sight. The rest of the team were led off to the right, the masked woman blocking Xipa as she tried to go after them.

“Where are you taking my flock?” she demanded.

“To a holding cell,” the woman replied. “They’ll stay there until you’ve explained yourself to our satisfaction.”

Xipa wanted to argue, but she held her tongue, giving her companions a reassuring nod as they were led away at gunpoint. Her captor aimed her pistol at her again, and Xipa got the picture, continuing along the raised platform. They exited the room through another door that led off the catwalk, emerging into an office. It was filled with rows of consoles that must have once controlled the now inactive systems of the plant, their blinking lights and holographic projectors long since dark. There was a window that took up the forward wall, looking out over the vats, giving the occupants a view of the farms. The numerous chairs and desks suggested that a couple of flocks had probably manned this place when it was in operation. As an Ensi, Xipa knew of similar facilities in her own city back on Valbara, though she had never needed to visit one in person before.

There was a table towards the back of the room around which were sat three women wearing old civilian clothes. They fluttered their feathers in a formal greeting, one that Xipa returned after a moment of confusion, her suit panels approximating the display. Her masked jailer stepped aside, keeping her weapon at the ready as Xipa slowly made her way over to the trio. One of them gestured to a chair, and she sat down opposite them, sliding off her helmet and shaking out her sheaths. She felt as though she had just transitioned from a hostage situation to a job interview.

“Who are you?” the middle woman asked, her tone curt but polite. She looked to be about the same age as Xipa, maybe a little older.

“I am ... Xipa’tla’nemi,” she replied, glancing between the three. “Ensi of Anabar and commander of the Consensus fleet.”

“What is the name of your ship?” another asked skeptically. This one had darker scales and an ugly scar on her lip that exposed some of her pointed teeth.

“I captain the battle carrier Vengeance,” Xipa said. The woman looked her up and down, examining what was to her unfamiliar clothing and equipment. The masked stranger stepped forward now, producing Xipa’s XMR from beneath her cloak, setting it down on the table. The scarred woman leaned over to pick it up, turning it over in her hands curiously.