Ariock’s inner voice imparted truths he dared not speak out loud. Truths such as: This is not noble.

This was not honorable. This was sick. This was tyrannical. This should not be how wars were fought.

“Speed it up,” Thomas ordered.

Jailers tugged chains, and the long line of prisoners were forced to stagger towards Thomas. Some of them pleaded for mercy. The next Red Rank in line pleaded in a babble—then bowed down and went silent as Thomas zombified him.

Jailers removed the shackles from the fresh zombie with practiced swiftness. A business-like govki waved an ocular wand to change the zombie’s eye color from red to white. Another govki slapped a spear into the zombie’s outstretched hands.

Freshly armed and programmed with instructions, the new zombie lurched towards the horde of zombies streaming along the causeways into Flawless City.

Thousands of brainwashed victims carried halberds, spears, or makeshift clubs. The ones in good condition were also outfitted with discarded blaster gloves which might misfire. These days, some zombies were even wired with explosives. Their Alashani keepers had not thought to turn them into suicide bombers, but Garrett had.

Distant screams carried on the wind.

“Good riddance,” a nussian captain said, his grim satisfaction aimed towards the city. “This is exactly what those Torth deserve.”

“We should mount their heads on spikes,” another nussian said with savage righteousness.

The local nussians had suffered. The Torth Empire had a knack for picking the most beloved former slaves to gruesomely behead. Some victims were folk heroes; smugglers or well-respected elders. Apparently the Torth Empire thought it was a good idea to torture those captives to death, then let their detached heads dangle from their own severed spinal ridges. They displayed them outside their city walls.

“Flawless City is softening up.” Garrett strode along the line of prisoners with a self-satisfied grin. He spoke to the captains and to Ariock, but mostly, he spoke to Thomas. “I’ve rounded up all the Rosies they had in there.” He gestured to the end of the prison chain gang. “I’d give it another hour. Let any remnants of inhibitor gas clear up. Then we can send in our sapient troops.”

Thomas offered nothing but a curt nod. He was zombifying another prisoner.

Ariock did not need to ghost into the city to know what it looked like inside: a blood-soaked slaughterhouse. The Torth who had failed to flee would be struggling to fend off zombies. Sure, the Torth had blaster gloves … but the defense cost them. They were getting bloodied. Injured.

Reduced in numbers.

That was the point.

Ariock’s people were more than happy to send zombies in as the front line “troops.” Zombies were disposable. From the perspective of slaves, such a battle looked like Torth versus Torth. Zombies were immune to pain, immune to fear, immune to inhibitor gas. They would fight until they dropped dead.

The actual Torth had no chance.

After the Red Ranks inside Flawless City contended with armed zombies who would fight to the death, they would face roaring nussians armed with blaster gloves, and a handful of shani warriors who could shoot lightning. Very few members of this Torth garrison would survive to become penitents.

It’s necessary, Ariock told himself. It’s justice.

His inner sense of justice disagreed.

Ariock looked at the nussian captains, and at Garrett, and then down at Thomas. He marveled at their righteous attitudes. Was no one else troubled? Hadn’t they seen enough brutality? Did they honestly believe that every single Torth deserve the same savage punishment?

What opinions was Thomas hiding behind his bland expression?

“You don’t need to be here for this, Ariock.” Garrett seemed to have picked up on his unsettled mood, because he gave Ariock a sympathetic look. “You might do more good visiting the troops back home and psyching them up.”

“But—” Ariock began to point out that someone needed to boost Thomas’s raw power. On his own, Thomas would get depleted after zombifying seventy-five or eighty Torth. It was an intensive power.

“I’ll boost Thomas,” Garrett said. “I don’t mind.”

Thomas nodded as he zombified another victim.

Lately, Thomas was agreeing with Garrett more often. Maybe he just didn’t like Ariock looming uselessly nearby. Or maybe he felt judged.

“All right then.” Ariock was glad for an excuse to distance himself from the slaughter.

He considered seeking comfort with Vy. But at this time of day, she would be busy with council matters. Anyhow, he did want to check on a certain contingent of his growing army.

“I’ll be back in an hour.” Ariock put himself into a clairvoyant trance, ghosted, and vanished before any of the nussian captains could plead for the Son of Storms to stick around and enjoy their tremendous upcoming victory.

Instead of teleporting to Reject-20, he went to a savanna region of Umdalkdul. Weptolyso and Irarjeg sat together in what used to be a slave plantation factory, drinking nectar that was likely spiked with firebomb ale.

Ariock appeared outside the door of their office. He knocked to alert them, then entered without waiting for an invitation.

“Son of Storms.” Weptolyso looked up, startled. “Welcome.”

Irarjeg jumped to his feet. Ummins tended to bounce when they did that.

“No need for formality.” Ariock waved for Irarjeg to be at ease. He looked from one to the other. “Please tell me, why are you in here instead of outside, working with the penitent recruits?”

Kessa had selected one thousand penitents to experimentally train as soldiers. She had assured everyone that her selection consisted of the most trustworthy penitents; individuals vetted by Thomas, and who regularly spoke out loud and swore that they wanted to redeem themselves.

Ariock wanted solid proof that Torth could be redeemed. That was what Thomas had promised half a year ago. If it worked? Then perhaps they could finally ease off on zombifying prisoners.

Weptolyso groaned and gulped his drink.

“There is nothing good to report.” Irarjeg stood straight, hands clasped behind his back, exemplifying his years as a hunting captain on his slave farm. “I believed we were making progress at first. Our penitents spoke as if they were willing to fight their brethren.”

“But there are hurdles,” Weptolyso put in. “Most soldiers refuse to fight by their side.”

“They don’t want their minds read.” Irarjeg had a placating tone, as if he’d offered a reasonable justification.

Ariock folded his arms, ready for the usual litany of complaints. He had heard it all before. No one wanted to work with evil rekvehs. Yeah, yeah. “Having a mind reader by your side in battle can actually be a benefit,” he pointed out.

Irarjeg looked ashamed. “Our soldiers are not as brave as you are, Bringer of Hope.”

“It has nothing to do with bravery.” Ariock felt irked. Why was friendship with mind readers such a difficult concept for people to grasp? If Ariock could tolerate having his mind read, so should his soldiers.

Although lately, admittedly, Ariock was less sanguine about it. Why did he always feel a step behind Garret, in terms of battle tactics?

“There is another aspect to this,” Weptolyso said in his gravelly rumble. “I have overheard soldiers joke that they won’t be able to tell friendly penitents apart from zombies or Torth in the chaos of battle. They may accidentally shoot our penitent allies.”

Ariock had no easy response.

“And the penitents know it,” Weptolyso said.

Ariock nodded. He still needed an easy way to delineate Torth allies from Torth enemies, if they ever gained such allies. Color-coded armor? Helmet crests?

The problem was that both sides of the war used essentially the same supplies and styles of armor. It was all Torth technology. Ummins and govki and nussians could not be mistaken for Torth, so they were safe from accidental friendly fire. But if his theoretically friendly penitent recruits wore the black armor of his soldiers, the Torth would soon use that color.

“We will address that issue once we have reliable Torth allies,” Ariock assured his nussian general. Perhaps they could use augmented reality goggles to point out friend from foe. “Our communications technology is improving all the time.”

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Weptolyso snorted with acceptance. “But those are not our only hurdles.”

Irarjeg sat at the table and took a quick sip of his drink. He seemed ashamed of what Ariock might perceive as a failure.

“Well?” Ariock leaned against the wall and folded his arms. “What other obstacles are you facing?”

He assumed that any other problems were miscommunications. Former Torth tended to speak in rigid, stilted sentences, and they showed little emotion. Former slaves tended to ascribe the worst of intentions to them. As a result, penitents and liberated people hardly spoke to each other.

Perhaps Weptolyso and Irarjeg were issuing commands in a way that insulted mind readers? Or perhaps their commands were too kind, whereas the penitents wanted explicit orders?

Weptolyso and Irarjeg exchanged a weighty glance.

“I believe it is best if I show you.” Weptolyso lumbered to his feet.

Ariock accompanied his friends out of the office, along the factory floor, and outside, into a partly cloudy day. The industrial areas were unattended. No work crews. The barracks looked abandoned, although they bordered a grassy square that looked trampled from recent use.

“Penitents!” Weptolyso bellowed. “Form up!”

There were no penitents in sight. Nothing stirred except for a breeze.

And a face. Ariock noticed a human-looking person peeking through the door of one of the barracks. She or he quickly drew back and the door quietly closed.

Irarjeg clicked his beak in derision and folded his arms. “See? I told you. They’re not going to come out even for the Bringer of Hope.”

Weptolyso made a noise of disgust.

Ariock looked from one to the other, needing an explanation. Why would penitents refuse to obey a direct command? He had expected challenges, but he hadn’t expected outright … well, what was this?

Outright refusal from the penitents?

“They seemed happy to accept our training when we began,” Weptolyso explained, seeing Ariock’s unspoken questions. “But a few days ago, they stopped.”

“They simply stopped.” Irarjeg seemed to think he was offering a more complete explanation.

“They won’t touch a weapon,” Weptolyso said. “They refuse to obey military commands. All of them beg to be transferred out of this combat unit and back to ordinary work crew duties.”

Ariock wanted this to be a miscommunication. If the best hand-selected penitents refused to fight and kill their Torth brethren, then there was no hope. There would never be any Torth allies. If the best penitents were just biding their time, pretending to be rehabilitated while secretly rooting for a return to their overindulged lifestyles of “godhood” … then they could never be trusted.

That meant zombification was the only path forward.

Ariock paced with his fists clenched, uncaring that the sky was reflecting his mood, darkening with clouds. He had been so hopeful about this. He had figured that if anyone could transform enslaved prisoners into friends, it would be Kessa and Weptolyso and people like them, selected for sensitivity and friendliness.

It should have worked. So much effort was going into the supposed rehabilitation of former Torth!

Kessa oversaw tens of thousands of lieutenants. Each one of them worked with a crew of penitents, one-on-one, for many hours every day. Thomas wasted time every morning scanning the minds of penitents, declaring them to be trustworthy.

Not trustworthy enough, apparently.

Thomas had acquiesced to the war council’s demands for more zombies without any protest. When Ariock had asked him how he felt about it—if he was okay with it—he had sounded resigned, but he had insisted that it was necessary.

No wonder.

It was actually necessary.

Ariock’s pacing intensified. He wanted to demand from Thomas how long he had known that Torth allies were a lost cause. Why was Thomas even bothering to pretend otherwise? Why not communicate the disappointing truth to the war council? That way, Kessa could spend her time on more useful governing tasks, Weptolyso could turn his attention back to leading armies, and Ariock could quit having false hope.

Why make everyone continue pursuing the futile dream that penitents could be integrated into a free society?

Ariock could guess why.

It was as simple, and as complicated, as Thomas’s ego. He doesn’t want to admit that he’s wrong.

As a super-genius, Thomas must hate being wrong. It was probably a shock to his system. It must be as awful as Ariock would feel if his strength gave out. So Thomas was twisting himself—and their entire military society—into knots, trying to float his hypothesis about widespread Torth redemption.

Because he refused to acknowledge failure.

He would continue to deny that he’d been wrong, right up until the Torth Empire destroyed them.

Ariock knew that he would need to approach this topic with delicate care, to avoid angering Thomas. Before he could have a serious discussion about restructuring their entire military strategy, he would first need to assure Thomas that failure was okay. That the leaders still trusted him. That Thomas was still an impressive mastermind, even with a memory leak and a little trouble foreseeing certain outcomes.

Ariock groaned. He didn’t mind having a critical heart-to-heart confrontation with anyone else. With Garrett? No problem. With Evenjos? Excellent. But with Thomas …

He really respected that kid.

He wanted to pretend there was no fear mixed in with his respect, but he remembered the story of Unyat and Audavian. No one sane wanted to tell a super-genius with mind control powers that his plan was fatally flawed.

The conversation needed to happen, though. No doubt Kessa wanted to bring it up, but if Ariock didn’t want to trigger Thomas, then people like Kessa must feel petrified with fear.

“Son of Storms.” Weptolyso sounded wary. “There is no battle here.”

Heavy raindrops had begun to fall. Thunder rumbled continuously.

“I see that.” Ariock forced himself to stop pacing.

He wasn’t going to pretend that there were not problems, though. His citizens on Nuss were being terrorized. Anyone who soared too far from Ariock’s territories got shot down. If people dared to ride a hovercart, or go for a hike, in a slave farm or orchard area, they were likely to get snatched and collared by Torth.

Or butchered.

The Torth on Nuss kept taunting free people with the tormented remains of their loved ones. The Torth there were basically saying, “Look at how inferior your species are to Us. Your people are disposable.”

Before the pink inhibitor gas, Ariock had shifted half of his population of Alashani warriors to the bridge continent on Nuss. But now? Even with the warriors wearing air tanks and gas masks and taking double and triple shifts of duty, there were not enough to fend off every Torth raid.

More than a dozen warriors had died in defense of nussian citizens. The raids had only stopped once Thomas started sending zombified hordes into Torth cities.

“PENITENTS!” Weptolyso roared even louder than before. “FORM UP!”

Moments later, a few penitents slunk out of the barracks. They looked reluctant, but they did line up like recruits. Perhaps it was the demand in Weptolyso’s tone. Perhaps it was the stormy sky and rumbling thunder.

A few wore scraps of black armor. The rest wore the plain, baggy outfits of penitents. Ariock noted that they barely took up a fraction of the square. The barracks remained full of life sparks. Hundreds of recruits remained hidden indoors, unwilling to even pretend to be brave enough to face him.

“Will you pick up a weapon?” Weptolyso asked.

The double row of penitents looked miserable. They kept their eyes downcast. Most had iridescent yellow eyes. Very few higher ranks survived battles to become penitents.

“Here.” Irarjeg peeled off his blaster glove and threw it at the feet of the nearest mind reader. “You can use mine.”

Ariock tensed and inhabited the air between himself and the recruits. He thickened it into an impenetrable shield. Irarjeg had just casually tossed them a tool of assassination.

“Pick that up,” Irarjeg commanded.

The penitent in question, a masculine-looking woman, visibly trembled.

“Or just bend down and touch it,” Irarjeg said with impatience. “Can’t you do that much?”

The penitent spoke in a whisper. “I will not break Kessa’s edict.”

Kessa’s laws for penitents included an edict that they were not permitted to touch weapons.

“You are exempt from Kessa’s edict for training purposes,” Weptolyso said in his gravelly voice. “You know that.”

Ariock scrutinized the double row of penitents. Young or old, fit or not … every single one of the penitents must be a sniveling coward.

“What are you afraid of?” Ariock asked.

A few penitents shuffled or shifted their weight. They didn’t seem to want to admit to anything.

“Answer the Son of Storms,” Weptolyso commanded.

One penitent cleared her throat. “We are afraid of battle.”

Soldiers lived with risks. That was the lifestyle. Ariock himself used to risk dying in battle, before he’d designed his ionic tungsten galaxy armor. He still lived with a slight risk that a Torth might catch him off guard and unarmored.

“You volunteered to train as soldiers,” he pointed out.

Silence.

“What changed your minds?” Ariock asked.

More embarrassed foot shuffling. The penitents really disliked speech. Either that, or they were terrified to admit whatever the truth was.

Maybe they were hopelessly self-absorbed, like Evenjos?

They were probably afraid to admit their belief that their “superior” lives were more precious than the lives of “inferior” soldiers. Ugh. Ariock turned away in disgust. There was no hope here.

“It was a good idea.” Weptolyso’s tone towards Ariock was comforting, meant to soothe. “They truly did seem willing to learn, at first. It was as if, all at once, they changed their minds.”

Irarjeg nodded in agreement.

All at the same time?

Ariock turned back to survey the few recruits who had dared to show their faces to him.

It sounded as if this unit had decided to quit combat training, en masse, around when the Torth began their brutality campaign. Maybe it had begun when the Torth attacked with pink inhibitor gas? Or had it begun when Thomas sent the first zombified horde to invade a Torth-held garrison?

Something had changed for these recruits.

A couple of them met his gaze. Most looked downcast, but the ones who looked back were searching. They couldn’t read his mind from a distance, and they seemed afraid that he would figure something out.

What?

What did the mind readers know, that Ariock did not?

It could be news from the Torth Empire, but Garrett or Thomas would surely have mentioned any news of note.

Besides, penitents were forbidden from ascending into the Megacosm. That was a core law. Garrett patrolled the Megacosm on a regular basis, and whenever he caught penitents there, he acted swiftly, executing the offender.

For that matter, Thomas still visited the Megacosm once per day, to invite Torth to join the right side of the war. Thomas was far quicker of wit and more widely perceptive than Garrett. If there were penitents hanging out in the Megacosm, he, of all people, would know about it.

He hadn’t mentioned anything like that.

But lately, Thomas was more paranoid than usual.

“The Torth Empire is taking losses that make no sense,” he’d said when Ariock had pressured him for an explanation. “Why are they leaving garrisons on Nuss? Why not evacuate the planet completely?”

Ariock had dismissed that. Collective decision-making was not always wise decision-making. Sometimes the Torth Empire did stupid things.

“They’re letting us defeat tons of Red Ranks and Rosies,” Thomas had pointed out. “We’re turning their best ranks into corpses or zombies. The Torth Majority is allowing that to happen, confident that their elder super-geniuses have some amazing secret plan that will defeat us. That alone has me worried. But on top of that, the top military ranks are enabling it. Something is afoot.”

No one had any answers.

“It worries me,” Thomas had concluded. “I can’t figure out what their end-goal is, if there is one. But I don’t like it. The Torth have left a lot of nuclear weapons and military ranks on Nuss. You need to be extra wary on that planet.”

Ariock stretched out his awareness and floated Irarjeg’s weapon back to him. A feeling of disquiet had taken root. He was missing some vital knowledge, and he had a feeling that these penitent cowards were part of it.

Perhaps they didn’t want to attack Torth because they collectively assumed, for some reason, that they would soon be forced to answer to mob justice in the Megacosm? Did they fear that the Torth Empire would re-conquer them?

If they had good reason to fear that, then Thomas and Garrett must know why.

Yet they hadn’t said anything about it.