But she wasn’t put off. This was merely a baseline. No one had bothered with animals for decades, which meant no researcher had spent much time trying to overcome the difficulties. Opportunity awaited.
“Don’t give up so easily, or I’ll reconsider what I said about ‘perfectly acceptable.’” She grinned at him. “Let’s see about the readings.”
That was when they realized the cow was still alive. It tried to lift its head as they walked over, but the effort proved too much. The sound that escaped from its throat could only be classified as keening, all the more wrenching for its low volume.
She crouched beside it, acid eating its way up her esophagus. The cow struggled harder, to little effect, as she drew a rune in charcoal over its wildly beating heart.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured, laying a hand on its flank.“Èower byre geendian.”
Its desperate movements stopped. It stared up at her with glassy eyes, dead.
Memories came faster and faster now. Trying different animals, demarcation stones, multiple runes, new spellwords. Explosion after explosion. Bigger, louder, less laughable.
“Holy—” Martinelli yelped, shielding his eyes. “That’s got to be the equivalent of a hundred thousand leaves! A singlefuckingpig!”
More experiments. Two pigs at once. Three. Five. Ten. A veritable barnyard of doomed animals, first snuffling, then squealing, then silent. So much death, she hardly noticed it anymore.
“I think we’ve hit the ceiling,” she said at fifteen pigs. “The increase in the readings really hasn’t budged since ten.”
Martinelli waved this away. “Still twice the kick we were getting from leaves. Let’s see Mercer poo-poothat.”
“Mm,” she said, looking at the still animals inside the demarcation circle. Noticing them.
“Time to tell him, don’t you think?”
She sighed.
Martinelli cocked his head at her. “What?”
“The implications worry me.”
“What implications?”
“Of animals as fuel.” She thought but did not addparticularly of intelligent animals as fuel.
Her deputy let out a disbelieving laugh.“Nowyou’re having second thoughts?”
“I know, I know.”
“Well … what do you want to do?”
As she hesitated, all the reasons to press on presented themselves in a neat line. Mercer demanded results. The country needed a deterrent. She could get a promotion.
And really, what choice did she have?
A later explosion. More dead pigs, this time out of sight in the control room at the other end of the building. Mercer shaking their hands. “Good work. Fascinating stuff—I really would have thought larger animals would produce more fuel.” Then: “You ought to try primates.”
Back in the bunker with Martinelli and a gaggle of others, their faces full of anticipation.KABOOM. One chimpanzee—far more effective than any of the animals they’d tried before.
She felt sick.
An office. Mercer, sitting behind a desk. “You’ve hit the ceiling on chimps?”
“Three, sir. Even so, they produce the largest blast radius. It’s up to a quarter-mile. Shall we call this a wrap?”
Mercer looked amused. “Eager to move on to something else?”
“Yes, sir.” She stepped closer to the desk. “I’d like you to transfer me out of weapons development.”
