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It’s tedious
and time-consuming work. But it’s amazing work. You can control the
creature’s movement, and you’ll have access to all the little
tunnels the creatures burrow to connect all the hovels together.
“
     
    “And what if someone squashes my friend
beneath a boot?”
     
    “Then you flip a switch on that remote and
access the eyes of another bug.” The general cycled through the
eyes of the cockroaches that scurried about the floor. “They’re
very easy to operate, and they’re smart enough to hurry back into
the shadows the moment you set the remote control aside. They’ll
make no noise, though their sensitive ears will eavesdrop on the
faintest of whispers. The men and women in intelligence burned the
midnight oil trying to decide the best place to drop our little
spies, and everyone thinks this village is the perfect place, and
that that boy provides the perfect subject.
     
    “The boy’s name is Abraham, and he’s not
even ten years old. Still, despite his youth, we’re confident that
he will soon suffer the torments and pass through the trials that
will show you the full measure of the tribes’ depravity. Spend the
next month watching that boy through the eyes of our bug friends.
See what that boy will become. Then cast your second vote regarding
whether or not to execute the ultimate answer.”
     
    “Will you accept whatever vote I cast?”
     
    The general sighed. “I can’t promise
that.”
     
    “You believe the threat to be so great that
you would consider breaking your vows to the elected
governors?”
     
    “I do.”
     
    “And there are no guarantees?”
     
    “I’m afraid not.”
     
    The general handed the remote control to
Governor Chen and said nothing more before standing and exiting the
cinema to leave Kelly alone in the dark, with the view from a
cockroach’s eyes glowing upon the silver screen upon which she
preferred to watch colorful musicals and situational comedies from
a civilized age lost so long ago. How could the tribes become so
depraved, so savage and barbaric, to deserve such annihilation? How
could their hate burn so hot that an entire world needed to be
sacrificed in order to preserve the potential humanity hoped to
discover in the waiting stars? Did the tribes’ children offer no
hope? Would General Harrison conduct a military coupe if she
refrained from approving the ultimate answer, and would such
rebellion be any less dangerous than the threat posed by the
tribes?
     
    Kelly Chen closed her eyes and wished it
would all vanish. She had never dreamed her skill at growing
tomatoes would ever force her to face the responsibility of such a
decision.
     
    * * * * *
     

Chapter 5 – Adultery Committed Against the
Maker

    “All of you look wonderful. I pray my
painting pleases our Maker.”
     
    Abraham smiled to watch his cockroach
companions scurry along the oval racetrack he traced upon his
chamber’s floor that morning with sugar water. He had painted all
of the bugs’ shells in his patterns of stars, sunbursts and swirls,
and those carapaces glimmered in his underground chamber’s dim
lighting. With each bug sporting a different color and pattern
scheme, Abraham soon chose favorites from his contestants. The
cockroach whose shell he had painted blue and dotted with silver
moons was the quickest of the bunch, but that bug seemed incapable
of following the trail long enough to maintain any lead earned by
its speed. A cockroach with a red shell sporting white diamonds
followed the trail precisely, but that bug moved at a snail’s pace.
The bug with the orange shell that Abraham decorated with black
swirls soon became his favorite, for that cockroach moved with both
precision and speed, so much so that Abraham wondered if that bug
might’ve been especially blessed by the Maker.
     
    Abraham winced when the cleric’s great horn
suddenly shrilled through the subterranean tunnels. The note was
deep and low, and the longer it groaned, the more Abraham