Episode Forty-Three Build a Fucking Army

N adira

I'm bereft. Being in the company of these strong, smart males and having their support gave me a false sense of hope.

I focused on what they had, not what they lacked. Our resources are primitive. Bows and arrows are no match against lasers. Our enemies even have the advantage of position. They're in their high tower. If they saw us coming, they could pick us off as easily as stomping on a swarm of ants.

"How did we delude ourselves?" I lament after telling them my concerns. The sheer futility of our mission crushes my soul. When I glance at my mates, I see their hope spooling out of them, too.

Just as quickly as the plans were demolished in my head, a new idea springs to life. Like a child's building blocks, once the old structure is obliterated, it makes room for a new scheme. I see exactly how things need to go.

As soon as it takes shape in my head, I share it with my males.

I've already painted a picture of why our current plan won't work, describing humans leaning out the Tower windows and picking off the monks and orcs climbing the exterior of the Tower.

I describe things I'd seen in vids, where males used their hovers and weapons to drop exploding projectiles on communities and villages housing females and children. My descriptions are so clear, the expressions on their faces told me they can see it, too.

"But I think there's a way," I tell them, nodding in excitement.

Even Thallose, who usually avoids my glance, is hanging on every word.

"Tell me, Azael, why were you so invested in doing this in the first place?" I ask.

"To avenge you, Nadira," he kisses my cheek and hugs Dhar and me closer.

"Before that, mate. Why?"

"Because they take our children whenever they want. They steal our young playing while they're with their toys in the clearing without a thought to the families they're destroying. They're terrorizing us."

"Right. Even you, Thallose. You want this war because they killed your parents and stole your sister, right?"

"Aye." The look on his face guts me. I've brought it all back to him. He probably hates me more than he already did.

"We need to travel to the factories to get our children back. Not just that. The towers manufacture nothing. It's all done on Earth. The hovers? The guns? They're all made Down Below. We need to do a recon mission to where they're housed. Then we need to free all the slaves and take everything that isn't nailed down."

I look my mates in the eyes and see each of them is leaning toward me, listening to every word I say, their eyes glistening with interest.

"We'll return to this camp laden with enough fuel and weapons to succeed in this war. How long have they been stealing your children?"

"Generations," Dhar's voice booms, the noise vibrating through his wide chest. "They've been taking our young as long as there has been an Up Above and a Down Below."

I pause, almost too excited to express this final thought. "Children grow up. Sadly, I doubt they all lived into adulthood. But the ones who did are the strongest of us. We're not just going to come back with fuel and weapons and children. We're going to come back with an army ."

As we've planned over the last few days, it seemed rote, almost unemotional. Now, every one of us is excited as we're reminded of our original mission. We want to bring our children back. And we don't want to win a minor skirmish against the human males. We don't want to dent their defenses and then wait like fearful prey for the predators to return. We want to beat them down, defeat them so badly they can never rise again. The way to do that isn't by half measures. We're going to build a fucking army.