A Creature of War, Book 4, CH20

The voices from the square were loud, agitated, and angry.
El had been with the other team leaders, giving their report to Vee when the officer found him to let him know of another brawl. EL had excused himself to leave, only to find Vee standing to accompany him.
By the time they reached the square, the fighting was under control, eighteen humans bloodied and bruised, but alive. No death this time. Still, what was he going to do with them? House arrest didn’t seem to have an effect on their behavior and he didn’t have enough cells to put them in.
And of course, this had been about food again.
“Do any of you understand that you don’t get any more food in a cell, than you do out here? For those of you who work, even get less in there.”
A woman on her knees among the brawlers pointed to one of the men next to her. “Then how come he gets more than us?”
“I don’t get more,” the man said. “Is that what this is about?”
“I saw you,” she snapped. “Your arms were loaded with food.”
“My arms weren’t loaded. I barely had anything, and that was for my entire family. My wife can’t leave our son and her grandmother. I had all their food cards.”
“He can’t do that!” he yelled at El. “One card per person! What’s to say they’re still alive.”
El felt like sighing, everything had been explained. But it was like no one had noticed. He approached the man. “Can I see your wife’s card?” The man handed it to him. El flipped it and looked through the lines. He showed it to the woman. “She her signature, next to the date?”
She scoffed. “That’s just a scribble.”
“Like yours. But that is hers. The top one was done under supervision when she picked up this card.”
“Fine, then how do you know he isn’t still keeping it for himself?”
“Because there hasn’t been any complaints made about fights and argument in his household.” El handed the card back to the man. “This needs to stop. You can’t fight just because we’re hungry, we’re all hungry.”
“Sure you are,” the woman spat.
El looked at her. “I don’t get any more food than any worker does.”
“You sure look healthy for someone who eats as little as I do.”
El did sigh. “Just ask one of them, they know how little food we all get.” He indicated the people behind Vee. Not all the team leaders had followed, but those there nodded.
“How would they know?” she replied. “When’s the last time they ate with you? Now it’s just the two of you eating together. Probably gorging yourselves on our food.”
El studied her. She was surprisingly informed for… a worker? It was possible she just liked keeping track of what was happening, but—
“He doesn’t gorge himself on food,” Vee growled. “Neither of us do.”
“Then why do you hide when you eat? You too look mightily healthy, oh great governor.”
“That’s not why—” Vee snapped his muzzle shut. He rubbed his face. He looked around and motioned to an orange and white cat to approach. “Mottled, are we ready?”
“Sir?” the cat looked around. “Sir, if we start now, building a reserve isn’t going to be easy.”
Vee nodded. “If we wait any longer, we might not have anyone to feed.”
“Yes, Sir.” The cat left, to confused murmurs, except from the woman. Her expression was speculative. She definitely knew more than El expected a worker to know. He’d have to find out who she was, and how she might know what she seemed to.
Vee looked over the crowd. “Alright, I was going to wait until we were in a better situation before making this announcement, but might as well do it now. One of the hunting teams found a large herd of animals and brought back a few.”
The crowd erupted in question and tentative joy.
“How long?” the woman yelled, standing. “How long had you had meat that you kept to yourself?” The crowd quieted. “You weren’t going to tell us, were you? You were going to keep them all to yourself. You want us to die, don’t you?”
“No, I don’t.” Vee growled. El looked at him. Saw the effort it took to control his temper. Was that woman purposely trying to anger him? What could she gain?
“Do you really want to eat animals that have been in the wild?” El said, pulling her attention away from Vee. “For all we know, they could be sick. These weren’t watched by machines, inoculated and whatever else used to be done to meat so you could eat it.”
“We’re hunted last year,” she replied. “We—”
“And how many people fell sick? How many of those sick was because of the meat?” He didn’t know, but that also meant they didn’t either. All he knew was that over the summer there had been a wave of sickness. He, Vee and Malcolm had agreed to use that as the excuse for the delay if it was ever brought up.
Vee placed a hand on his shoulder. “My job is to ensure as many of you survive as possible. That means making hard decisions, but each and every one of those decisions has always been with you in mind, not me, you. I’ll take your anger over the delay, because it means the meat will be healthy for you to eat.”
The crowd’s noises sounded more affirmative now. Malcolm had been right about this too, El realized. So long as they thought it was done for them, to keep them safe, they would accept hardship.
“Starting tonight,” Vee raised his voice, “The rations will be increased.”
The crowd exploded in cheers. When it calmed El had his officers disperse it, leaving him, Vee, twelve officers and the eighteen brawlers, still on their knees, except for the woman he glares at the bull.
“Except for you,” Vee said. “Prisoners don’t get increased rations. So use the time in the cold cells to think on what happened here.”
“Hey,” the man protested. “I didn’t start this. I just defended myself.”
“I don’t care, you fought. The two of you are the reason the others joined in. Consider yourself lucky I don’t give you longer sentences,” Vee told him.
El didn’t react to the Bull overstepping his authority. Sentencing was  El’s department.
“You saying I should have run away? I’m not some puss—”
“Yes,” Vee cut him off. “The rules are clear, any fighting will be punished. I have patrols for a reason. You go and tell them about the attack.” The man’s face turned red, and he opened his mouth, but Vee growled over him. “I don’t care what you think that makes you look like. If you need to fight to prove that you’re a man, then your manhood better be able to handle the cold, because a man like you is going to spend time in a cell.”
Vee motioned for the officers to take the group away. The officers looked to El, and he nodded. When they were in private, he was going to have a talk with Vee about this.
* * * * *
The noise in this room was a pleasant sound. Toddlers babbling incoherently as they crawled about. Older children playing games and older ones seated in front of an old man, listening to him. The large fireplace had a grill far enough from the fire so that the toddler pressing against it wouldn’t feel too much of the heat.
El found one of the Anthro toddlers and couldn’t stop the smile. Anytime he saw them, he felt hope.
He didn’t know how it could happen. In the centuries he’d been alive, there had never been a birth among the Anthros. He’d have heard about it, he was sure of that. The Freak Lab was where anything unusual was sent. It had only meant Specialists, but a birth would have ended up there.
And now, there were seven Anthro babies.
Everyone had a theory. The army had put anti-fertility drugs on their food. One of the Gods the humans worshiped had looked down on them and decided they would be fruitful. One of the Crazies had done this to them. One of them had made it so they hadn’t been fertile before. El’s own theory was that whatever had changed the world, stopped the technology, altered the elements, had also done this to them.
Seven children here. How many elsewhere? How many communities would survive this cold? He hoped many of them did.
He should have come sooner, he should have made the time, but he hadn’t. Now he regretted it.
He noticed the Anthro women because they weren’t elderly, more than because of their fur. He canted his head as he tried to work out why they were here.
“They won’t let us get close to them,” A woman said next to him. She was old, almost skeletal and her hair was thin wisps. “You were wondering about the mothers. The cubs won’t let us come close to them.”
El considered her words as a coyote picked up her child. He, or she, he had no way to tell, sniffed the air before burying their tiny muzzle in her fur.
“It’s the scent,” El said.
“We’d worked that out,” the woman replied, smiling. “It’s the why we don’t get.”
“That young…” El hesitated. He was no scientist, but he’d read a lot over the years. “It’s instinct. Our sense of smell is better than yours. It’s how they recognize who is family.”
“I suppose that makes sense. How long will it last? When are they going to recognize the rest of us as friendly?”
El shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Didn’t you go through the same thing?”
El smiled. “I was made, not born.”
“Oh, right. Sorry. You’re a soldier. I never paid much attention to those things.”
El nodded, not taking his eyes off the mother and child. “If you’ll excuse me.”
“Hello,” the coyote said. She turned her son, he was naked, and sat him on her lap, facing El.
El crouched before them. “I’m El, who is this?”
“This is Francis, say hello Francis.”
The boy studied the lynx, then yipped and yapped. When he was done with his greetings, he squirmed and turned himself around. He nuzzled his way to her breast. El canted his head as the boy latched his mouth around the nipple and suckled.
“I hope this doesn’t make you uncomfortable,” she said, cradling the boy so he had easier access. “I’m Maria.”
“I’m just wondering what he’s doing.”
“He’s feeding. The human women do it like this. They’re who showed me. The men tend to look away.” She motioned to the room. “This was a good idea the Governor had.”
El chuckles. “He hates the title. His name’s Vee, VeeDee if you want to be formal.” He indicated the child. “May I?”
“Please wait until he’s done. It shouldn’t be long. Then, if he lets you, you can touch him.”
El nodded. “How did it happen?”
“Last winter, we had to bunk up it was so cold. We weren’t ready for it. Me and Walter shared a bunk for heat. He was the only other yote in my unit and we were friends. It wasn’t the first time we’d had sex. I’m not picky, but I do prefer yotes, and Walter knew me, so he was my regular partner.”
Francis mewed and she readjusted him. “A few months after the winter began, I started getting sick. I was throwing up a lot in the morning. One of the women called it morning sickness, and I didn’t think more about it, since it did happen in the morning, but when it kept happening, I saw a doctor and he said I was pregnant. My stomach grew over the next months and then Francis came.”
“So Walter wasn’t the first time you had sex?”
“No. I’m seven, I’ve had plenty. My first unit commander showed me. He’s who Francis is named after.”
“A commander, so he was human?”
She nodded. “He showed everyone in the unit over the first week. After that, he encouraged us to do it together. Something about it making us a better unit. He had a lot of strange ideas about what made us better fighters. We were already trained after all.”
“Infantry?”
“Yes. Walter is, was I guess, there is no army anymore, so I don’t know if the classifications still matter. He was Support Class.”
Little Francis released the breast and mewed. She wiped his muzzle.
He looked so fragile, El thought.
“Let him smell your finger. Get used to it, then you should be able to touch him.”
El offered a finger, and the boy grabbed it, pulled up to his nose and sniffled. He rubbed his cheek against it, then chewed on the tip.
“He doesn’t mind Anthros,” she said. “But he doesn’t like how human smells, well adult humans. If they come close to him he mews and tries to crawl away. He doesn’t mind the other children.”
El chuckled as Francis attempted to eat his finger. “Does he speak?”
She shook her head. “Yipping is as close to words as he comes. Walter is worried that unless the machines start working again, he won’t learn how.”
Could he learn even with them? El wondered. If Anthros being fertile hadn’t been part of the scientists’ plans, what would Francis be? An Anthro or more like their four-legged counterparts? He looked Anthro now, but maybe any toddler looked like this, and the way he looked might not represent how his mind would be.
“I’m sure it’ll come. Have you asked the human mothers how it is for them?”
“They say that it’s still early to expect him to say words, and that some children are late bloomers.”
El let Francis chew on his finger, then excused himself. The boy mewed as his chew-toy was taken away. El promised to be back when he had the time.
He made sure to come back every day after that, having decided that nothing was more important than watching the Anthro’s future grow, play, and chew on his fingers.
* * * * *
They were headed to the newest block of rooms when El found out the animosity toward Vee ran deeper than any of them expected.
Vee had wanted to look over the work, so he, El and three officers, two humans and one bear, were headed there when they found their path blocked by a group of humans armed with swords. Eleven of them.
Vee had looked at El, and the lynx kept the officers from taking out their swords with a gesture. He and Vee weren’t armed.
“You’re done,” the man at the head of the group spat. He looked healthier than the others. His hand was black, short, but had a sheen to it they others didn’t. His clothes were worn, but in better condition than the rest.
“What is this about?” Vee asked in a neutral tone.
“It’s about putting you animals back in your place. You don’t get to come here and take over. This place is ours, not yours.”
“I know that. I didn’t take it from you.”
“Yeah? Then what do you call killing the Governor and taking his place?”
“Doing what’s necessary to survive the winter.”
“You mean making sure we’ll suffer and die off. The Governor fed us properly.”
The bull rubbed his face. “Haven’t I explained this already? The way Artell was feeding you, you’d have been out of food already. And I’m not targeting anyone. Look around everyone is suffering.”
“You’re not,” the man said. “He isn’t.”
“My power lets me regulate my body. I get more out of the food I eat. I do the same to El because he's my boyfriend.”
“Right, that’s a fine excuse. You eat as much as you want and then you say it’s your ‘power’ that keeps you healthy. Animals like you don’t have powers, it’s just a lie the army came up with to scar—” He fell to his knees with a groan, clutching his stomach.
Vee crouched before him as the others took a step back. “What you’re feeling is your intestine tightening. I’m causing that, with this power you claim is an army lie. I can control your body as easily as I do mine.
The man panted, but relaxed a little. “I want to be in charge,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone. Vee raised an eyebrow. The man forced himself to his feet, and the bull followed suit. “You said you didn’t want to be in charge, so give me your job.”
Vee snorted and crossed his arms. “That was weeks ago. I didn’t see you coming forward then. I’ve done too much work now to let someone come in and crew it up.”
That, El thought, and if a human took charge, they’d find out what they’d been eating.
“Show up once the snow’s melted. That’s when I’ll be leaving, you still want the job then, it’s yours. Until then, why don’t you get back to work? unless you want to spend time in the cells?”
The man didn’t move, but the group stepped closer to him. El readied himself or an attack. Instead a hand grabbed the man’s arm and pulled on him. The man wrenched his arm out and glared at Vee. The person leaned in and El tried to get a good view, but the group moved with her, he did make out she was a woman. She whispered something to the man, and he turned the glare on her. If she flinched the group hid it.
“This isn’t over,” the man told the bull. He turned and walked away, the group closing around him.
“Yeah, I think it is,” Vee replied to their back as they turned the corner.
“I don’t think it is,” El said. “Was it a good idea to let them leave?”
“They’re allowed to express their displeasure. I might have to force things on them so they’ll survive the winter, but I’m not going to take away their right to tell me how pissed about it they are. I’d rather they scream at me than fight among each other.”
“They were armed, Vee. At the very least, we should have taken the swords away.”
“They didn’t use them. And until you find out how they got them, there’s no point, is there?” there was no accusation, just a statement of fact. “Did the woman look familiar?”
“I didn’t get a good look, she used the group to hide as much as possible, but I think she’s the woman from that brawl a few weeks ago.”
“Isn’t she in a cell?”
“That batch finished their stint there three days ago.”
“And she’s already back fermenting trouble. I guess you should keep an eye on her.”
“If it’s her, but yes, I’ll have people check. And on the weapons too.”
Vee nodded, and they continued on their way.