Mindworm, Part 6

[Googlie]

A worm’s a worm for a’ that……………..


I was now running the Peacekeeping faction.

They didn’t know it, as they still looked to Commissioner Lal for decisions, but he was my puppet. Sarita had trained me well.

I sat in on all executive meetings in UN Headquarters and participated in every discussion. Lal didn’t object, so how could his minions. (And how could he, when I inserted an undetectable mindprobe into his neural synapses and suggested **Invite Little Hatchling to your meetings – he has much to contribute.**

I was a Demon Boil now. The metamorphosis had taken place on the journey from Mt Planet back to UN Headquarters. We had encountered a lone wild mindworm of some ferocious size and temperament, and I sensed my battle impulses crying out for action. I willed my way to the front of the pack and took on the challenge.

It was short, sweet and satisfactory. Somewhat bruised psychically, we detoured past the old monolith to effect the necessary repairs.

I left the army in charge of a Great Boil brother, and made my way alone to headquarters.

Sarita had trained me well. All the hours spent in the exercises to learn to focus my psi-powers into a narrow singular band were paying off. I could control direction and intensity over an immense range, and as a Demon Boil my strength and power were awesome.

I soon found myself invited to join the War Council, then the Executive

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The first task I set myself was to find out why my Sarita had been at the front lines at all, and why she had been exposed to capture by Yang’s troops.

I tentatively opened flicker psi-probes into the minds of those around the war Council table. The Minister of Defense….knew of the assignment, but after the fact. I moved on. The Minister of the Interior…..barely knew Sarita, and was unaware of her death even. Production….like the Defense Minister, only knew after the fact. Then I hit paydirt. The Chief Science Officer.

I sensed guilt. I cautiously strengthened the probe, and erected some trace barriers. I dug a little deeper, and probed his memories. There had been concern with the new squadrons of locusts, that they were being rushed to the front after inadequate training. Yes, they were formidable fighting units, more than a match for anything Yang could currently put out in defense. But they were somewhat immature, a little erratic. Sarita had volunteered to go closer to the action, to be within their effective psi range, with less command distortion. Accordingly she had moved to one of the captured cities in Yang’s territory. His agents had informed him of her arrival, so he had expended troops and materiel in an effort to effect her capture, and had succeeded.

I relaxed somewhat. I had originally wanted to attend a War Council meeting with the intent of finding out who had ordered her to the front. If identified, I was prepared to inflict ten times the mental anguish on that human as was suffered by my beloved Sarita, even if my psi-energy burst killed them all in the room and even if it cost me my life as well.

But she had volunteered. Typical of her, thinking of her charges before her own safety. My rancor softened as the memory of her generosity in giving of herself permeated my consciousness, and I relaxed.

My target was Yang.

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The Hive needlejet made a low, slow, pass over the aerospace center at UN Headquarters, its landing gear down and flaps extended, an historical symbol of non-belligerence. “Hold fire”, the SAM battalion major yelled, “it’s not attacking us”

As it performed its slow flyby, its bomb doors opened and a synthmetal wrapped package dropped out, thudding along the runway. The needlejet retracted its undercarriage and flaps, activated its fusion reactors, and crested its own shock wave as it accelerated through mach 6 on its return to friendly territory.

In the command room, Lal’s comm-link beeped. He flicked it on to the overhead monitor. Yang’s evil face leered out. “I’m returning your worm-worshipper, Lal. I’ve finished with her.”

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If I could have, I would have wept.

The ceremony was moving. I had persuaded Lal to grant me special interlocutor status at the dedication.

Lal concluded " . . . and in her memory, let this base henceforth be known as ‘Sarita Base,' that her bravery can serve as an example to all and that her hopes, her dreams, her deeds shall not have been in vain."

I rested on the high podium in the crowded commons of the base once styled Zeta Sector Base, where so much of my training with Sarita had been undertaken.. A mixed crowd of soldiers and VIPs and other civilians provided sustained applause as Lal rededicated the settlement in Sarita’s name. Anyone who was anyone in the Peacekeeper faction was present, such was the regard in which Sarita had been held. Across the peacekeeper territories all the population was tuned into the ceremony.

The dedication complete, Lal turned to me and said to the assembled audience “Sarita’s first pupil, Little Hatchling, is now going to address you”, and sat down.

The crowd was abuzz. How?, they wondered. Address us how?

I had strategically positioned my worm troops in each base throughout Peacekeeper territory, and linked my personality to theirs. In turn, they sent out psi probes throughout the minds and consciousness of the citizens of the various bases relaying and intensifying the images I now transmitted. I had enlisted Planet’s help in the endeavor..

Sarita as a small child, riding her first bicycle. In a girl guide’s uniform. Matriculating from University. Emerging from cryosleep on the Unity. Proudly donning her first peacekeepers uniform. Her first mindworm capture. Some of our training routines. Her capture at the hands of yang’s troops. Pang approaching with extended probes. Yang’s face grinning evilly, and her words reverberating in the collective mind of all of us “You Bastard”. Her bruised and desecrated body lying on the catafalque. As I finished, I left them with my personal memory, of her fingers mussing my tendrils.

To each, individually, it was as if she were caressing the hair on the nape of their neck.

Commissioner Lal wept openly. In every base, tears were shed without reservation.

My own distress was relayed and magnified by my cohorts, resulting in an even greater collective grieving that fed upon itself.

I had trouble steadying my own emotions as I sought to dampen my psi anger. But I was unsuccessful.

My anger and thirst for revenge was picked up by the crowds all across the territory. My desire was translated into their will and their resolve.

In unison, they chorused:

“Let us march on The Hive and eradicate that faction”