INVASION

She gave Gerrard an apologetic smile. "We're doing our best. There's not enough space, not enough supplies-"

"Something's wrong," Gerrard broke in. He gestured to Ha

Orim nodded and knelt beside the pallet. "She's been doing this for the last hour. I've cleansed the wound and applied opiates. I fear to give her more, lest they poison her. I've tried every spell and meditation. Even Cho-Arrim magic is no match for this plague."

"I'm fine, really," Ha

"Let me see the wound," Gerrard said.

"It's nothing," Ha

Orim's jaw muscle leaped. "I'm going to pull back the gauze. It's time to check the wound anyway."

Tears standing in her eyes, Ha

With quick and expert motions, Orim drew back the bedclothes, exposing Ha

Beyond the fabric, Ha

"That doesn't look so bad," Gerrard said hopefully.

Orim pulled loose the gauze. It came away only reluctantly. Its warp and weft clung to the seeping flesh. A great weighty gob came loose. Crimson blood and black rot were mixed on the packing. Orim drew it aside, setting it in a silver tray.

The wound was a canyon in Ha

"That's the peritoneum," Orim said. "It protects her organs. If the disease spreads beyond that-"

"We have to stop it," Gerrard murmured intensely. "Can't you cut away the infected flesh?"

Orim shook her head. "That's how it got this big-I cut away the rot, but it returned. The roots of the infection are too long. Look." She pulled back more of the dressing gown. Beneath the pink of Ha

"We have to stop it. You have to find a cure."

"Yes," Orim replied quietly, repacking the wound. "Yes, I know."

"All right," Ha

Gerrard pulled her hand away and clutched it tightly. "You're right. You'll be fine. Orim will heal you. I've ordered her to. We're destined to stay together-"

Ha

Smiling, Gerrard nodded. "You're right. But I always knew what I wanted, and I always wanted you."

As she finished bandaging the wound, Orim said, "Gerrard always gets what he wants."

"Damn straight."

A familiar voice echoed through the speaking tube. "Orim, is Gerrard down there?"

He answered with levity he didn't feel, "Ah, the third goddess summons! What is it, Sisay?"

"You'd better get up here. We're coming up on something."

"On my way," Gerrard answered. He bent, kissing Ha

Beyond the murmur of the wounded, the hum of the ship's engines was omnipresent. It was a comforting sound-straightforward power. In the face of that roar, no obstacle seemed insurmountable. How could a little disease resist such power?

Gerrard gained the deck and climbed to the forecastle. Beyond the prow was a strange sight.

Low above the sparkling waves, a lone Phyrexian cruiser flew. It seemed almost an island instead of a ship, except for its speed. The cruiser's black mass left a churning sea in its wake, waves driven up by the force of enormous turbines.

"What are they doing down so low?" Tahngarth asked. He leaned on the rail.

Gerrard lifted his spyglass, extended it, and peered down. "They seem to be fishing."

Along the lower rail of the Phyrexian cruiser were batteries of harpoons. Scaly crews ma

"Just like Phyrexians to kill dolphins," Tahngarth hissed.

Gerrard shook his head grimly. "Just like them to kill merfolk."

Through the spyglass, he saw. The bolts below ripped into the undulating tail-fins of fleeing merfolk. Those shots seemed somehow to be self-guided. Each one burrowed straight up the spine of a creature. All life fled the bodies. Lanced corpses floated to the surface and lolled on the waves. The cruiser drove on, just above them, with no apparent attempt to retrieve the kills.

"What are they doing?" Tahngarth snorted. "They'd not waste a whole cruiser on harpooning, would they?"

"Those aren't normal harpoons."

Gerrard trained the spyglass on the crews at the guns. Whatever they loaded into those launchers wriggled like snakes-not snakes, centipedes. Long thin legs extended from the main body. They hungrily lashed the arms of the crews that loaded them. One gu

"Spinal implants," Gerrard said in realization, "just like the one Volrath used to control Greven. They're killing merfolk and then-"

Before he could say it, the spyglass caught movement among the slain merfolk. They lifted lolling heads. Their limbs jerked horribly. The dead things turned and stared in awe at the vast ship. Their backs were long, raw wounds where the former spine had been ejected. The flesh was as torn and corrupted as the gash in Ha

"Oh, that's it," spat Gerrard, folding the spyglass. He whacked Tahngarth's chest. "Let's get to the guns. We'll sink that mermaid-killing, zombie-popping, black-boil-onthe-butt-of-the-world slave ship."

Lifting an eloquent eyebrow, Tahngarth said, "If you say so."

"Battle stations!" Gerrard called out between cupped hands. Flipping open the speaking tube beside the port-side ray ca

Sisay's voice replied, "Aye, Commander. I thought you'd have something to say about this. How close do you want us to pass?"

"Close enough to clip their horns," Gerrard called back as he strapped himself in behind the ca

Tahngarth rubbed one of his own horns. "That's close."

"Drive them into the sea. Let 'em rust beneath the waves. Let 'em feed the sharks."

"Aye," was all Sisay said.

The ship pitched sharply forward. Her prow dipped past ragged white clouds. The black cruiser came into view directly beyond the figurehead. Air spilled up past the gunwales. Weatherlight plunged into a dive. Her engines mounted up, trailing coils of vapor. The manifolds roared.

The airfoils trimmed backward. Wind screamed off their streamlined tips. All that noise might have alerted the monsters below, but the ship punched through her own sound envelope, outru

Weatherlight was an axe head rushing down to split the vast ship below. Beside her and behind her swarmed the ragtag fleet. Every last gun buzzed, its charge building.