Sunday, April 3, 2022 Aqrabuamelu compound; Flushing, Queens, New York, United States

How do you find a doctor to do in vitro fertilization with no questions, minimal medical examinations, and make sure they do their job well?

You could have them do it and kill them after. Ella refused. She pointed out this might not be the only time they need to do this and going around killing multiple fertility specialists was a bad idea.

You could also just pay them a shit-ton of money and bug their home to make sure they didn’t betray you. Which is what they did.

The specialist, Dr. Massen, was an older no-nonsense woman who had been well regarded but had run into ethical issues at one point. Perfect for the kind of bribe that could lead someone to retire a bit early.

And so… they began to get the selected volunteers from the Aqrabuamelu ready, giving the volunteer women hormones.

Ella got Professor Fedoriw in his final act before leaving to give her permission for a sabbatical. She was free of her classes after this semester for at least a year, but would continue to have access to university facilities. And so she began to go to the biology labs and practice her magic sight, trying to detect smaller and smaller items. She could manage to just about sense a cell relatively quickly, but smaller, sensing DNA for example, eluded her for now. And, of course, she wanted to take it much further. To that vision she had of quantum fluctuations when she had first absorbed the bear tooth.

Arcsa and Bahu took her reports in stride. Despite their quiet desperation, they had millennia to become patient and let her have her space.

She even convinced them that they should send off DNA which they did to a local lab. When it was sequenced and came back human but with some random aberrations, one of them transformed and they took a sample from the scorpion half. It came back as the DNA of Hottentotta Tamulus , the Indian Red Scorpion.

Additional DNA samples were sent of a variety of tissues and specimens. The techs of that lab never knew how close they had were to death should an anomaly be discovered. Arcsa did not tell Ella.

And so it went…

Ella stood outside of the room with the drow in it. She felt so guilty…

“What should I do?” she whispered to herself.

“We have given it a nerve block for pain,” Arcsa said, startling her. “And it is healing, but it will never move easily again. It asks God to deliver it from its uselessness.”

Arcsa was calm as he reported what they had done to the drow. And Ella did not know how to deal with that.

“I sometimes miss the second moon.” Arcsa said idly, somewhat orthogonally. He was wistfully staring into the one way mirror that hid them from the drow.

Second moon? Ella thought. But before she could follow up, Bahu came into the room.

“Well, can the drow see it?”

“Ansheth,” Ella insisted. “I haven’t gone in yet.”

“Well come on then. Let’s go.”

But Ella couldn’t make her feet move. She was a coward.

Bahu looked at her. “It wants to die for its God. We will release it to go to its fate once you have proven your magic against it.”

Bahu paused a moment and drove home the obvious, “The longer you take to test your magic, the longer it suffers.”

“Is there a moral choice here?” Ella asked.

“Only the morality of necessity,” Arcsa answered. It was the only morality the Aqrabuamelu thought they needed.

Ella walked in. The drow was on the table, unbound. He could not move anyway, it’s arm and leg tendons having been severed. Ansheth’s face and body were bandaged extensively.

When it saw Arcsa, he said, “Forgive me God for failing you. I long for death in your service.”

Arcsa said simply, “Obey this woman,” pointing to Ella and then left the room.

“Ansheth. I am Ella.”

“Ella,” the drow agreed. It looked at her expectantly and then began muttering to itself… Ella could only hear the shapes of words but not able to make it out. It laughed suddenly and then went quiet and then started muttering again.

Enough of this. “Ansheth!” When Ella had the drow’s attention, she said, “Can you see this?”

And she drew a simple tripwire, the same magic lines that she had started with.

“It shines.” the drow said and then cackled. “It shines, shines, shines. Shines shines.” He started singing that word over and over again.

Ella dropped the magic and began casting anew. This time a line, but with those knots that she had developed to preserve the energy.

“What about now.”

But Ansheth kept singing variations of the word shine and laughing randomly.

Arcsa came back in, observing from the other room.

The drow immediately stopped, and repeated again, “Forgive me God for failing you. I long for death in your service.” But this time it put more emotion into its voice at the word death.

“What did I tell you to do?”

“One cannot help but remember God’s words. God commanded me to slay this woman. Shall I do so now?”

Ella wondered what would happen if Arcsa said yes, but he merely reaffirmed the order to obey and left.

“Can you see the line now?”

“Yes.”

Ella thought for a moment. “Is it different than before?”

“It is less shiney. Shiney shiney shiney…”

And he was off again.

Ella retreated from the room and when the door closed behind her she leaned against it and felt her heart racing.

“What did we do to you?” she whispered to herself, regarding the drow, no, Ansheth.

“He is quite mad,” said Arcsa. “I cannot stay in the room long before he tries to buck off the bed in order to kneel at my feet. And I dare not say much in case I confuse him.”

“Did you hear what he said?” Bahu said excitedly, “Your tying off method helps. You must refine it.”

And what that meant was that Ella would face her sin each and every day. So that she might grant Ansheth release one day. For he was suffering, and she had caused it.

“I intend to do two things for Ansheth,” declared Ella. She needed to make some good out of this horror. “I will learn to hide my magic, as we need that. But also I am going to try and free his mind from both his religion and his madness. So he can make his choices free of them both.”

And suddenly Arcsa’s knife was at her throat. So fast, she thought.

“You will not free us from our religion the same way,” he said through clenched teeth. “We do not wish for it and such an attempt would be your death.”

Ella wished he would do it. She wondered when she had become inured to the thought of her death. But instead, she dared to ask, “How do you know you do not wish it?”

Bahu was agitated as well. “We know it because once there were heretics. And they did not want to be, but they could not believe. And we slew them all until none were left. Our faith was not as deep as the drow.”

Ella breathed out slowly. She could feel Arcsa’s blade against her throat and a little trail of blood from where it had already cut her.

Something in her snapped. She shoved with magic and Arcsa flew back, as did Bahu. They both hit the back wall with a thud. The metal door behind her dented out. The one way mirror shattered.

“If I am Inanna Reborn, then I will make you better and freer, and if that means taking away your chains, then I will do it.” She screamed. All her guilt, her pent-up frustration came out.

“This,” she waved her hand behind her at the dented door behind which was the reminder of her immorality, “will never happen again.” She strode out the exit and to the gym, to work off this anger and guilt by punishing a stuffed leather bag.

Zaidu observed the human girl from a camera as she hit the bag. Innana Reborn? A human?

But she had magic, not the paltry bits that they clung to.

Arcsa and Bahu had taken him aside.

“She is our savior. But she has not fulfilled the prophecy.” Arcsa, Prophet of Blessed Innana, told him.

Zaidu watched her and thought. Human? It made him want to spit. They were a pestilential species with no virtue besides the industry of locusts. They were on the cusp of planetary ruin and instead of flaying those responsible and parading around with the skins, they worshiped their destroyers.

Disgusting. He spat to the side.

But Eleanor was something else. As he heard the story of Ekerri and the crowning, of Bahu’s attempt to kill her with a novice team — and there would be hell to pay for that amateur shitshow; Eleanor coming into her magic, wild and uncontrolled; and the training and the loyalty she had shown to her squad. Ziadu’s face took on an uncharacteristic smile.

Ekerri had picked what he thought was a sheep, but she was a wolf. A wolf cub, he amended. Eleanor had done well, she was one of the most driven humans Zaidu had met, he would have put her up with Sargon or even Jeanne perhaps. He wasn’t sure who the right parallel was.

He was actually pretty pleased with her. Not that Zaidu would admit it to her or let up. Her role as their coming savior meant he would have to temper her further. The Aqrabuamelu expected more from those with power. And failures were punished harshly. Especially for those in power.

And so he walked over to the gym. Had Ella join him on the mat. And then put her down on that mat hard. Over and over again.

She never stopped, she didn’t complain. She got up and went all out each and every time. Her strength was that of someone much larger, but her skills were not even nearly honed to the level he had after thousands of years of constant battle.

Again and again they went. She went until she was trembling, barely standing. He took no pity and kept the pressure on. Harder and harder.

Their goddess would be iron, she would be steel.

He said nothing, just waited as she got up. Was excited when she launched from a kneeling position to try and gain a surprise advantage. But his soul was singing. His goddess was here, and she was everything he could want.

Well, except that she was vermin. But disappointment could be part of faith too. Einige seiner besten Freunde waren Ungeziefer.