Page 56 of Unrest
“Wait,” Short Matt said. “Sir, are you saying . . .” Matt looked at Linette and she raised her eyebrows. He shook his head. “Never mind.”
“Yes, Sergeant,” Linette said in that husky, I-take-shit-from-nobody voice. “I seduced an alien for intel. Is there something you’d like to say about that?”
I fully expected him to shut up, but to my surprise he blurted, “What was it like?”
When everyone laughed, he said, “No, I mean, I’m not trying to be perverted, I just mean . . . are they, like, the same as us?”
“Anatomically,” I clarified for him. Rylen shot me a look and I shrugged, blushing. “Just helping him find the word.” Again, the scientific part of my mind was darkly fascinated.
“Yes and no,” Linette said. She looked at First Sergeant as if asking permission to continue, and he waved a hand as if she may as well go on. Linette took a soldier’s stance, feet spread, eyes watchful and full of no nonsense.
“Their testicles are internal.” This simple sentence caused a hushed guffaw to rise up. “Will you all grow the fuck up?” Her shout hushed everyone and she continued. “Their testicles are on the inside. Everything else is . . . similar enough. That’s why we have to check all the males who enter the compound.” She glanced around the room and her eyes landed on Rylen, then back to Top as if she were finished.
Holy freaking shit of all shits. She hadcheckedhim? As in, Linette saw Ry’s junk? I turned to him, my eyes bulging. I know he could feel me looking, but he stared straight ahead, his arms crossed. He reached up and tugged his ear lobe. I scoffed and faced front again, crossing my own arms and grinding my teeth together.
“Any more questions?” Top stared hard at the room.
“How about the females?” Tall Mark asked. “Are they similar to human females?”
Top nodded to Linette to respond. “Biologically very similar, from what the subject told us, except the fact that they have zero urge for sex outside of mating season. We learned that sex outside of mating time is legally forbidden because it makes the men worthless. They’re not permitted to have homosexual relationships or to masturbate.” Sputters of shock filled the room. “And there’s no hiding it. If a man in Bael has somehow activated his sexual hormones, it’s like he’s been hitting lines of coke or shooting up. He’s out of it. Eyes rolling back, incoherent for up to two days afterward. Those who become addicted and can’t get their acts together are not tolerated.”
I shook my head. They sounded like a miserable race, and for a second I felt bad for them. Until I remembered they were the people who’d taken over our planet and killed my family.
“Do they kill them?” Tater asked.
“Worse,” Top said. “They basically deactivate their personalities. For a thousand years they’ve been using an uninvasive procedure to control those who show signs of rebellion. Tiny, mechanical worms that they insert in a person’s nose or ear. It makes its way to the brain and essentially imbeds like a clawed hook into the anterior portion of the frontal lobe. That part of the brain controls planning, problem-solving, organizing, behavior, emotions. Basically personality. Without that function they are robotic, receiving and acting on commands.”
The hair on my arms went straight up and I had to rub them down. “Sir,” I asked, “Have they been using those on humans?”
“To be honest,” he responded, “our Baelese prisoner is under the impression that the Bael who took over had run out of the worms, and the two ships that landed this century were out as well. But his own ship had plenty, along with the scientists to make more. So they have them now, and I’m betting they’re trying them on humans as we speak.”
Nausea rolled through me. All I could do was shake my head. This was how they could make slaves of us.
“Continue with what you were saying, First Lieutenant,” Top said to Linette. I tried to shake off the creeping sensation and focus.
“Okay. Ah, their gestation times for pregnancies are shorter, around six months, and during their evolution they phased out breastfeeding. The babies are mostly cared for by the younger generations of women using a type of bottle for the first several months until they can eat solids. So, basically they start going into their mating season from the ages of thirty to forty, and the girls and young men from seventeen to mating age generally care for the children. Child rearing in Bael is a communal process. Their collective civilization centers on the whole, rather than the individual. They don’t have traditional family units as we know them.” She looked back at First Sergeant and stepped back in front of the desk, signaling she was done.
“We have one last bit of information,” First Sergeant said. “And it’s important. Probably the largest obstacle we’ve faced, and will continue to face, when it comes to this enemy.”
Worse than their superior knowledge, super bodies, freaky worms, and complete lack of compassion for individuals? I felt myself frowning as he prepared to drop this next bomb on us.
“These beings possess a mental capability that humans do not possess. They have a second brain the size of a marble in their frontal lobe area that is able to radiate mental energy outward on ultraviolet wavelengths within close range, say ten to fifteen feet.” Cold sweat beaded across my skin. “This is a device for the amplification of brain waves. In this way, they are able to silently communicate with one another . . . not in words, but in moods and intentions. They’re also able to push their own desired moods and intentions into another’s mind.”
What. The. Hell.
My hands went clammy, and if I were standing I would have passed out.
“Holy shit,” Tater said. “I think they used that on me.” He looked at Remy, me, and Rylen. “When Grandpa . . .” His eyes unfocused. “I had this weird urge not to get in the way.”
“Yes,” I whispered. Strange pieces began to fall into place—all the times I’d wanted to argue with the DRI women, but found myself feeling suddenly compliant. They’d beenin my head. It was a violation of the worst kind. I wrapped my arms around myself, feeling disgusted, my mind spinning like a funnel around all of the memories.
First Sergeant looked at our pinched faces. “We have many instances of soldiers here experiencing similar things during their interactions with DRI. But from what we’ve gathered the waves can be muffled by the use of earplugs. We have to process the waves as a sound, like . . .” He shrugged. “Like a dog whistle.”
We were like dogs to them. It was all making so much sense.
“Other questions?” First Sergeant asked.
I raised my hand. I had so many. “Were all of the DRI . . . aliens?” The word felt weird in my mouth—a word that used to be something we laughed about and was now a horrifying actuality.
