The mantis looked up at him, triangular head cocked, sawtoothed arms held high.
"Striped Mouse. Porcupine." The calm, still voice came from everywhere and nowhere. "You have come far to see the end."
"May we sit at your fire?"
"You may."
Renie began to understand. "!Xabbu," she whispered "That's not Grandfather Mantis. It's the Other. It's taken this from your mind, somehow. It appeared to me as Stephen—pretended to be my brother."
!Xabbu only smiled and squeezed her hand. "In this place, it is Mantis," he said. "After all, whatever you call it, we have finally met the dream who is dreaming us."
She sat down beside him, feeling limp and emotionally exhausted. All she wanted was to be with !Xabbu. And maybe he's right, she thought. Why fight it? Logic is gone. We're definitely in someone else's dream. If this was the way the Other chose to communicate—perhaps the only way it could communicate—then they might as well accept it. She had tried to force the Stephen-thing to see reality in her terms and its anger and frustration had almost killed her.
The mantis tipped its shiny head down, then up, regarding them with tiny, protuberant eyes. "The All-Devourer will be here soon," it said. "He is coming to my campfire, too."
"There are still things that can be done, Grandfather," said !Xabbu.
"Wait a minute," Renie whispered. "I thought if anyone was the All-Devourer in this story, he was. It was. The Other, I mean."
The insect appeared to have heard her. "We are at the end of things now. My fight is over. A great shadow, a hungry shadow, will swallow all I have made."
"It does not have to be that way, Grandfather," said !Xabbu. "There are those who might help you—our friends and allies. And see! Here is your Beloved Porcupine, she of the clear thought and brave heart."
Brave heart, maybe, Renie thought. Clear thought? Not bloody likely. Not in the middle of this cracked fairy tale. But aloud she said, "We want to help. We want to save not just our own lives, but the children's lives, too. All the children."
A minute twitch as the mantis shook its head. "It is too late for the first children. Even now the All-Devourer has begun to eat them."
"But you—we—can't just give up!" Renie's voice rose in spite of her best intentions. "No matter how bad it looks we still have to fight! To try!"
Mantis seemed to shrink even smaller, drawing in on itself until it was little more than a spot of shadow. "No," it whispered, and for a moment its voice was as raw and miserable as a child's. "No. Too late."
!Xabbu was squeezing her hand. Renie leaned back. However frustrating it was, she had to realize that this . . . thing, whatever had formed it, whatever shaped its thoughts and dreams, was not going to be argued into doing the right thing.
After a long silent time !Xabbu said, "Do you not think of a world beyond this? A world where the good things can be saved, can grow again?"
"His mouth is full of fire," Mantis whispered. "He runs like the wind. He is swallowing everything I have made. There is nothing beyond this." It was quiet for a moment, crouching, gently rubbing its forelegs together. "But it is good not to be alone, we think. It is good to be where the campfire still burns, at least for a little while. Good to hear voices."
Renie closed her eyes. So this was what it had all come down to—trapped in the imagination of a mad machine, waiting for the end in a world built from !Xabbu's own thoughts and memories. It was an interesting way to die. Too bad she'd never get to tell anyone.
"Come, it is too quiet," said Mantis. Its voice was very small now, like the merest brush of wind through the thorn bushes. "Porcupine, my darling daughter, you are sad. Striped Mouse, tell the story again of the feather that became the moon."
!Xabbu looked up, a little startled. "You know that story?"
"I know all your stories now. Tell it, please."
And so, in a moment of calm beneath the fiery stars of an African night sky—a moment that seemed like it could last forever, although Renie knew better—!Xabbu began to recite the story of how Mantis created life from a discarded piece of shoe leather. The dying mantis crouched beside the trickling stream, listening intently to the tale of its own cleverness, and seemed to find it very interesting indeed.
They had prepared not just a fire, but a wall of fire—an arc of papers, boxes, empty grain sacks, and other combustibles they had piled in front of one corner of the room and set alight. Behind the fiery barrier was stacked every piece of remaining furniture not bolted to the floor—desks and chairs, even the lids from the V-tanks that were not being used. Even the spaces between objects were crammed tight with thin military mattresses.
But those things will not stop bullets, Joseph thought sadly. Stop no dogs either.
A flicker on the monitor caught his attention. "They are moving now. Light the fire."
"It's t–tempting," said Del Ray, not hiding his panic very well, "but I'll wait until you're back here with us. Just tell us what's happening up there."
Joseph was feeling increasingly exposed as he watched the four mercenaries upstairs leaning over the hole, gesturing. They had already strapped on their combat gear, puffy vests, and hoods with goggles. He resented having been given monitor duty just because he had supposedly fouled up before. That—we were going to stop that truck driving away, somehow? Stop them getting those big monster dogs? But even his resentment was nothing against the skin-tightening, horrible certainty of what was to come. "They are ready," he said out loud. "I don't need to stand here no more."
"Just tell us what they're doing," Jeremiah said.
"Dressing up the dogs," Joseph told him.
"What?"
He squinted at the monitor. "No. First I think they wrapping the dogs up in blankets, but they are doing something else." Just the sight of the things made his guts watery. The huge animals were shivering with excitement, their cropped tails wagging rigidly. "They . . . they are using the blankets to do something. Maybe to carry them." He watched miserably as the men approached the pit they had dug into the floor, using attached ropes to haul the blanket, the first mutant ridgeback sitting upright in the center like a royal personage. "Oh. Oh. They are going to use the blankets to lower the dogs down through the hole."
"Shit," said Del Ray miserably. "Time to light the fire. Come on!"
Joseph did not need to be urged. He sprinted across the floor of the darkened lab and jumped over the wall of file papers, then clambered up over the furniture barricade, almost knocking over Del Ray as he tumbled down the far side. "Go ahead! Light it!"
"I'm trying!" Jeremiah moaned. "We didn't have enough petrol left to get it really soaked." He flicked another of Renie's cigarettes from shaking fingers. The papers caught with a whuff of ignition. For a moment, as blue flames ran along the makeshift barrier, Joseph felt a tingle of hope.
"Why the lights out?" he whispered. "Then we can't see to shoot them."
"Because we've got two bullets and they've probably got thousands," Del Ray said. "Just stop arguing, Joseph, Please?"
"Dark isn't going to fool no dogs," Joseph pointed out, but more quietly.
Del Ray made a strange noise, a kind of groan. "I'm truly sorry, Joseph—I don't want the last thing I say to be 'shut up.' But shut up."
Long Joseph could feel his heart getting big in his chest, big but weak, trying so hard to beat fast even though something was squeezing it badly. "I am sorry we are all here."