Devil's Due (Destroyermen #12)(7)
“Oh my God!” Sandra cried, rushing to him despite the efforts of her guard to hold her back. She knelt in front of the Lemurian leader, a new fury rising that threatened to explode when she saw her friend’s face. Adar was about forty, the same as his lifelong friend “Ahd-mi-raal” Keje-Fris-Ar. That wasn’t particularly old for Lemurians, who generally lived about as long as humans, but Adar looked very old now, to Sandra’s searching eyes. Always thin, he’d become practically emaciated, his gray fur matted, and silver eyes dull as he regarded Sandra without apparent recognition. He still wore what his Amer-i-caan friends had dubbed his Sky Priest suit, with silver stars embroidered on the hood and shoulders, but it was just as torn and dingy as the Lemurian wearing it. Sandra wheeled to glare at Kurokawa.
“What’ve you done to him?” she roared. Kurokawa actually blanched, but his face purpled again and his eyes bulged enormously. “Only I demand here, Minister Reddy,” he snapped, using her medical title within the United Homes and the Grand Alliance. He glanced at Muriname, however. “But the General of the Sky assures me nothing has been done to him—beyond subduing him and the others’ continuing, misguided resistance. Other than that, he simply won’t eat. Nor will the other ape-men. Gunnery Sergeant Horn and Kapitan Leutnant Lange both say his people”—he nodded at Adar—“cannot thrive in captivity. Is this true?”
“Of course it’s true!” Sandra stated, and it was—to a degree. But she’d never expected this. She immediately decided Adar was literally starving himself to death to keep the Japanese from using him against his people, and the ’Cat sailors were doing the same to corroborate his excuse. In a way, it was brilliant, and she suddenly wished she could get away with something similar. But that won’t work with us, she knew, or for Horn and Lange.
Kurokawa frowned. “I find that difficult to believe. The League has held ape-man prisoners before,” he informed Sandra, startling her, but he hesitated before going on, an uncertain expression joining his frown. “At least some survived to teach League spies their speech.” He pointed at Adar. “He was the leader of your alliance, after Captain Reddy, of course,” he said harshly. “And though I’m inclined to believe, as he insists, he’s of little value as such now—no doubt my radio operators can learn his language as easily from you as him,” he threatened, “I may yet make use of him and do not want him to die. You’re his doctor. Save him.”
Sandra was still absorbing the implications of the fact that the League had Lemurian prisoners. The Allies transmitted in code groups, but had always felt secure using Lemurian for voice communications. No wonder the League knew so much! Her mind whirled. “You’re keeping him—all the others—in the same kind of cell as us?” she demanded of Muriname.
“Yes, but . . .”
“Then that’s your answer!” Sandra snapped scornfully. “The League must’ve kept their Lemurians confined in the open. They can’t stand the kind of captivity you’ve had them in for long, and will die no matter what I do! Why do you think the Grik never keep Lemurian prisoners, or eat them as quick as they can when they get them?” She felt fairly safe asking that. Kurokawa must’ve seen that for himself when he commanded all the Grik in India. Still, he snorted, and even Muriname looked skeptical. “Look at him!” Sandra thundered. “Do you think he’s faking?”
Kurokawa clasped his hands behind his back and appeared to think furiously. Finally, he barked at Muriname in Japanese.
“We will prepare a . . . compound,” Muriname said grudgingly, as if trying to envision how that would work in his mind. As far as Sandra had seen, they didn’t have barbed wire. “Your men, Lange and Horn, will construct a shelter within a fenced area we will build,” he continued, “with space out of doors.” He frowned. “We’ll have to put you all in it together,” he warned. “Such a place will require constant guards, and we can’t spare enough to watch you separately.”
Sandra shook her head. “I don’t care. They’re our friends. They won’t take advantage of us,” she added, knowing Muriname, at least, might very well attempt it. He might even have been counting on their isolation to facilitate that. Sandra shuddered at the thought that three hundred other men probably had the same idea. Much as she loathed him, Kurokawa was hers and Diania’s only protection from that. For now. She looked back at Adar and finally saw a spark of recognition in his eyes.
“No,” he rasped, barely audible. “You must not do this. I love you, Lady Saandra, but I want to die. I need to die!”
“What more do you require?” Kurokawa demanded, thankfully misinterpreting Adar’s meaning, and possibly alarmed by his determination. He’d helped create the Grik suicider flying bombs, but apparently even he considered Lemurians to be more like people than the Grik. Or possibly the fact that four of them obviously preferred a terrible, lingering death to what he must’ve considered a benign incarceration even appealed to his ideal of the Bushido Code he expected his men, if not necessarily himself, to follow. Or maybe he really did hope to use Adar.
“Fresh air, food, sunlight, and at least the illusion of space around them. That’s the only thing that’ll save them now.”
“Very well,” Kurokawa grunted, looking at Muriname. Then he repeated Sandra’s own earlier thoughts, almost to the letter. “See to it. After all, they cannot escape. Where could they go?”