Mad Dok by Nate Crowley

Author:Nate Crowley
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2021-11-01T13:57:11+00:00

V

‘Now obviously,’ said Grotsnik, his stitch-riven chest puffed out with pride, ‘there was a lot of fighting still to come, after that. But as far as I’m concerned? That was the moment we won the invasion of Tempestora Hive.’

‘Yeah,’ said Drippa, its face entirely motionless, earning it a scowl from the dok. ‘Great story, boss. Just got one question, though.’

‘Oh, did I miss something?’ hissed Grotsnik, nostrils flaring, as he towered over his nonplussed audience.

‘Just one thing, yeah… the pole.’

‘What pole?’

‘The one you fixed the boss’ heart with. You said it was a banner, right?’

‘I… think you… yeah.’ The dok snorted, taken aback. ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’

‘Do you remember what was… on the banner, at all? Like, a picture or sumfink?’

‘Uh?’ grunted the dok, his long, scarred face crunching up in bafflement. But then, as some mean little detail fell into place, deep within the algal folds of his own mind, realisation set in. His lone red eye, furrowed into a smouldering volcanic crack with concentration, flared suddenly in shock, and his mouth gaped in wordless exaggeration, as what had seemed such a trivial detail at the time swelled to monumental importance.

‘Was it that banner?’ asked Drippa, a mean strand of mucus swaying across its sharp little grin, as it extended a claw towards the mountainous shape of Ghazghkull’s torso in the gloom.

There, screwed into a socket high up on the boss’ fortress of a shoulder, and glinting weakly where endless bullet-strikes had hammered and holed it, was indeed a tattered metal banner. And on its lumpy surface, copied faithfully from the copy of a hundred previous copies, was the design that had first been daubed in the Prophet’s own blood, back in the yard behind Grotsnik’s own medical tent.

Makari? Makari? Makari?

The name echoed in Grotsnik’s head, like a drumbeat, coming from every direction at once. Is this it? he thought to himself, as the full misery of the truth continued seeping through his skull like ice water. Am I finally, properly, going mad?

But Grotsnik was not going mad. Or if he was, it had nothing to do with the name he could hear being shouted, over and over again. Because the name, he heard now, was being repeated in the same, unmistakable voice whose bellows and barks had underscored Grotsnik’s work for some time now. It was Bullets, somewhere outside the laboratory’s door. And there was, in fact, a drumbeat underlying it. Something like a drumbeat, anyway: a wet, thudding crack, just a moment or two after each repetition of that hated name.

Makari? Crack! Makari? Crack! Makari? Crack!

Despite the many, many other thoughts clamouring for space in Grotsnik’s mind, then, he could never ignore the evidence of somebody else getting know-wots wrong, and he clicked his tusks in contempt.

‘The zoggin’ moron,’ he muttered. ‘He’s trying to find them, isn’t he? Trying to find a new Makari. Goin’ along a line of grots, I’ll bet, and braining ’em when they don’t respond.’ The dok shook his head mournfully, and absent-mindedly gathered a spanner from his belt.

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