by David Adams
A dog is the only thing on Earth that loves you more than he loves himself.
New Panama
World of Polema
May 19
2239 AD
Four years before the events of Symphony of War: The Polema Campaign
I’m Demon. I’m a good boy. I know I am because Emily told me so.
“Get in the car, Demon,” Emily says, frantically pulling my lead, trying to drag me into the open car door. Emily is my human and today is not a very good day. Evacuation sirens wail all around me. “The Prophets Wept, hurry!”
I don’t want to. I whine and pull back, pushing away from the door.
Even though I’m a good boy, I don’t want to get in the car today.
Sometimes the car is good; it takes me to the park, or to the vacant block near the water purification plant, where I can run and play and jump. Sometimes it takes me to the vet. Then the car is bad. I can normally guess which one it is. If we’re going to the park, Emily is relaxed and happy; if we’re going to the vet, she’s unhappy and stressed.
I don’t know what to think of the car today.
Emily is terrified.
I can smell it on her. The other humans, her parents, are scared too; the stink of their fear is everywhere. Emily’s father is in the steering seat. Her mother is in the other. She has the boom-maker from their cupboard. I can smell something strange in the boom-maker. Sulphur and chemicals and metal.
All the humans in this block are scared. And that makes me scared. There’s so much noise; thunder in the distance and flashes of lightning.
I run to Emily every time there’s thunder, and she’s never scared; she soothes me and tells me I’m a good boy. This is different.
This time the thunder scares her too.
“Emily,” says Emily-mother, her voice stressed. “We have to go. The roads are going to be blocked if we don’t move.”
Emily starts to cry. This upsets me more. I pull away from the car. She pulls back.
“Come on, Demon! Get in, get in!”
No! I don’t want to get in. Normally I’m a lot stronger than Emily, but fear gives her power. She drags me roughly into the back seat. My neck hurts. Emily-mother slams the door behind me so I can’t escape.
The car starts to move. I jump up, looking out the window. Our house, red bricks and green grass, disappears behind us. We’re heading away from the park and toward the vet. I start to bark. No vet. Not while there’s thunder.
So many cars, all driving in the same direction. Some are going on the wrong side of the road. With a thump, our car drives up on the middle part, and over to the wrong side, too. Cars swerve, and their whining engines hurt my ears. They are driving so fast. Heedless. Away from the house; away from everything.
Running.
The sky lights up in flashes; huge clouds billow, black and bruised, on the horizon. They rise in strange ways, like no cloud I’ve ever seen before; a giant ball of cloud slowly rising, and there’s fire underneath it. Then another flash, and another. They hurt my eyes.
“Shit!” says Emily-father, his voice hollow. “They’re using nukes. The evacuation hasn’t even begun.”
I don’t think we’re going to the vet.
The car swerves to one side. A huge car is coming down the road—it is like a very big box, and it has a big boom-maker on top of it. Our car gets out of the way. Another car doesn’t; the big metal-box drives over it, crushing it like a can. The people inside die. Did they have a good boy too? I didn’t see.
Another metal-box is right behind that one. And then another. It is a long train of metal-boxes with strange wheels. They have boom-makers on top.
“We have to get going,” says Emily-mother. “Can we get around?”
“The tank just drove over those people,” says Emily-father. “I don’t want to get too close. Hang on; if I swing on the outside…”
“Be careful,” says Emily-mother.
The car starts to move again. We’re only part of the way on the road; the car shakes uncontrollably. We’re very close to the metal-box, passing it on one side.
I bark and paw at the window. Emily tries to hold me down but I’m frightened. I don’t want to be crushed. I don’t want to be lightninged to death. Go away, metal-boxes!
We pass the column of metal-boxes. Our car surges ahead of the others; there are fewer cars ahead. I stop barking. I did it. I scared them away.
“Good boy,” says Emily, rubbing my neck. “Good boy.”
I lick her face. She still seems very frightened; I want to help. I don’t understand what’s happening, but it’s okay. As long as I have Emily, I will be okay.
“It’s the Earthborn,” says Emily-father. He seems very worried; his fingers clutch hard at the steering wheel, and he doesn’t look at us. “It has to be.”
“If it was the Earthborn, they’d say so,” says Emily-mother. She holds the boom-maker close. “It’s not going to be another Reclamation.”
“What else could it be?” Emily-father shouts.
I don’t like shouting. I bark.
“Keep Demon quiet,” says Emily-mother. “Dad’s trying to drive.”
“Shh,” says Emily. She rubs my neck some more. “Shh, Demon. Be a good boy.”
Everyone smells frightened and angry. I don’t understand what’s happened.
We drive on for some time. The sun begins to sink ahead of us. We leave the sirens and the thunder behind us. Emily-father drives very fast. The car complains; I can understand. I wouldn’t want to run for this long. But I’m a good boy, and I don’t complain. I have Emily and everything’s okay.
Emily-father and Emily-mother are mostly quiet. When they do talk it’s always in hushed voices about things I don’t understand. Emily gets more scared as we go; I think her parents are trying not to frighten her, but if they are, they’re doing a bad job.
I know the car can speak to them all. Humans have metal in their bodies that allows them to hear what the car, or the house, says. They listen to things like games and hear things happening a long way away from here.
I can tell by how quiet they are that they’re listening a lot.
“New Panama News says the military is containing the outbreak,” says Emily-father. “An outbreak of what, exactly? I heard someone say they were bugs.”
“Some kind of bioweapon?” asks Emily-mother. “Could we be infected?”
“I don’t think it’s a disease,” says Emily-father. “Listen to the way they talk. They keep stressing to people to take their weapons with them. You can’t fight bioweapons with shotguns.”
“You can’t fight bugs with shotguns either,” says Emily-mother.
I put my head in Emily’s lap. She pats my ears. I feel a bit better. Wherever we are, we’re a long way away from the vet, and that’s good.
“We need to stop and charge,” Emily-father says. “It’s down to one bar.”
“There’s a station up ahead.” Emily-mother twists around to look at us. “How are you two travellers?”
I’m okay. I feel a lot better. Although even a trip to the vet is less scary than this.
“I’m gas,” says Emily. “But I need to pee.”
“We’re going to be stopping soon,” says Emily-mother. “I’ll come with you.”
Emily stops patting me. “I don’t like people watching me when I go.”
“This is different,” Emily-mother says, stress in her voice. “I need to come with you. It’s not safe by yourself.”
“What’s going on? Is it the Earthborn?”
Emily-mother shakes her head. “It’s not the Earthborn. We don’t know what it is. My ’net is clogged.”