Monsters of Men

“She hasn’t found anything in the information the Mayor provided?” Bradley asks.

I shake my head, starting to cough. “If he’s provided everything.”

“Thirty-three days until the convoy arrives with a full medical bay,” Bradley says. “Can you hold on?”

I nod, but only because I’m coughing too much to talk.

The past week has gone unnervingly smoothly. Wilf rides down the road with tanks of water and rides back with cartloads of food, no problems at all. The Mayor’s even sent soldiers to protect him and engineers to improve the water collection. He’s also accepted Mistresses Nadari and Lawson to help inventory the food and supervise the distribution.

Mistress Coyle, meanwhile, looks happier than I’ve ever seen her. She’s even started talking about how to make the truce. Apparently, this involves a lot of blowing things up. Mistress Braithwaite, who did my soldiering training what seems like a lifetime ago, plants bombs in the trees, hoping to show the Spackle we can outwit them and also hoping to capture one who isn’t killed in the blast. Then we’ll send it back saying we’ll keep blowing things up if they don’t talk to us about peace.

Mistress Coyle swears this is how it worked last time.

My comm beeps, Todd calling with final word after the attack.

“None survived, did they?” I ask, coughing some more.

“No,” he says, looking concerned. “Viola, are you–?”

“I’m fine. It’s just coughing.” I try to swallow it away.

I’ve only seen him over the comm the past week since our big meeting by the old house of healing. I haven’t gone down there and he hasn’t come up here. Too much to do, I tell myself.

I also tell myself it’s not because a Todd without Noise makes me feel really–

Makes it seem like–

“We’ll try again tomorrow,” I say. “And again and again until it works.”

“Yeah,” Todd says. “The sooner we can get those truce talks started, the sooner this is all over. The sooner we can start making you well.”

“The sooner you can be away from him,” I say, realizing too late that I’ve said it out loud. Stupid fever.

Todd frowns. “I’m fine, Viola, I swear. He’s being nicer than ever.”

“Nice?” I say. “When was he ever nice?”

“Viola–”

“Thirty-three days,” I say. “That’s all we have to get through. Just thirty-three more days.”

But I have to say, it feels like for ever.

[TODD]

The Spackle attacks keep coming. And we keep stopping ’em.

Submit! We hear Juliet’s Joy shouting down the road. SUBMIT!

And we hear the Mayor laughing.

Heavy hoofbeats come pounding outta the darkness, the Mayor’s teeth shining in the moons-light. You can even see the gleam of the gold threads on the sleeve of his uniform.

“Now, NOW!” he’s calling.

With a disgusted cluck of her tongue, Mistress Braithwaite presses a button on a remote device and the road behind the Mayor erupts in gales of flame, instantly burning the Spackle who were in pursuit, Spackle who thought they’d found a random soldier away from what seemed to be the obvious trap we’d laid down another path.

But that trap wasn’t a trap. The random soldier was.

This is the fifth attack we’ve stopped in five days, each one getting cleverer with us getting cleverer in return, with fake traps and fake fake traps and different paths of attack and so on.

It feels pretty good actually, like we’re finally really doing something, like we’re finally–

(winning–)

(winning the war–)

(it’s ruddy thrilling–)

(shut up)

(but it is–)

Juliet’s Joy comes heaving to a stop next to Angharrad, and we all watch as the flames gather up into a cloud rising thru the trees and dissipating against the cold night sky.

“Forward!” the Mayor shouts, the buzz of it rocketing thru the Noise of the soldiers gathered behind us and they surge past in formayshun, racing down the road after any Spackle who might still be alive.

But from the size of the flames, it don’t look like there’ll be any left this time neither. The Mayor’s smile disappears as he sees just how much destruckshun there is down the road.

“And yet again,” he says, turning to Mistress Braithwaite, “your detonation is mysteriously too big to leave any survivors.”

“Would you rather they killed you?” she asks in a way that says that’d be fine by her.

“You just don’t want us to get the Spackle first,” I say. “You want to get one for Mistress Coyle.”

You could pretty much eat dinner off the glare she gives me. “I’ll thank you not to talk to your elders that way, boy.”

Which makes the Mayor laugh out loud.

“I’ll talk to you any way I damn well please, Mistress,” I say. “I know yer leader and there ain’t no pretending she’s not up to something.”

Mistress Braithwaite looks back at the Mayor, not changing her expresshun. “Charming,” she says.

“Yet accurate,” says the Mayor, “as usual.”

I feel my Noise go a little pink at the unexpected praise.

“Please report to your Mistress the usual success,” the Mayor says down to Mistress Braithwaite, “and the usual failure.”

Mistress Braithwaite heads off back to town with Mistress Nadari, scowling at us as they go.

“I’d do the same if I were her, Todd,” the Mayor says, as the soldiers start to return from the fire, no living Spackle found, again. “Keep my opponent from getting an advantage.”

“We’re sposed to be working together,” I say. “We’re sposed to be working towards peace.”

He don’t seem too worried about it, tho. Just look at the soldiers marching past us now, laughing and joking amongst themselves at what they see as another victory after so many defeats. And there’ll be still more to congratulate him when we get back to the square.

Viola tells me Mistress Coyle’s getting the same hero treatment up by the scout ship.

They’re fighting a war over who can be more peaceful.

“I think maybe you’re right, Todd,” the Mayor says.

“Right how?” I ask.

“That we should be working together.” He turns to me, that smile on his face. “I think maybe it’s time we tried a different approach.”