Carnifex

'Climate change requires

Solar output be ignored

Or lose nice funding.'

Fosa nodded at that one, sipped at his sake contemplatively, then answered:

'Great fireball in sky,

How to explain you away

When moons' icecaps melt?'

'Oh, very good, Fosa-san, Kurita applauded. 'You're getting the hang of this.' He then declaimed:

'Wondrous hockey stick

Replaces Christ's wooden cross

Comes from white noise.'

White? White? Fosa wondered. How to play on that? Ah, sheep are white.

'Climate change white sheep

Hate being out of the flock

Lest they be shorn . . . baaaa'

'Bah! Bah, indeed,' Kurita exhulted.

'Great Climate Change!

For heretics, deniers,

Jail cells are waiting.'

Fosa answered:

'Even Progressives

In Fed'rated States Senate

Say, 'Piss on Kosmos!''

From Kurita:

'Climate change loonies

Shriek, 'Heresy! Blasphemy!'

Whenever questioned.'

Fosa expanded:

'Gathering firewood

To burn up the deniers.

We've seen this before.'

After he stopped laughing, Kurita gave:

'Virgin SUV

Cast into the volcano

As the faithful dance.'

At that point, Fosa gave up. The image of ten thousand grass- skirt clad Kosmos, deep in religious ecstasy, sacrificing an innocent automobile to the dark earth gods was too much. No doubt much of his mirth was found in the sake, not the poetry. Even so, Fosa was rolling on the floor laughing when, to cap his victory, Kurita gave his last recital:

'High Kosmo leeches

Attend luxury conference

Always fly first class.'

* * *

Fosa's reminiscences were interrupted by the sudden arrival of a Cricket on the flight deck. With a plane needing as short a landing run as the Cricket, and landing into the wind, to boot, all arrivals tended to be very sudden.

No sooner had it landed, and the pilot killed the engine, then that pilot was out the door and racing across the flight deck to the tower. He disappeared from view, only to emerge on the bridge moments later.

'My fucking radio went down, Skipper,' Montoya announced, even before formally reporting. 'I'd have come back right away but there was something odd, a boat, I saw hidden in the jungle.'

'Odd?' Fosa asked.

'Three ways, Skipper. One was that it was pretty well hidden. Another was that it looked fast, what I could make out of it. The last was that there were armed men aboard, and they didn't shoot at me.'

Kurita's finger beat Fosa's to the alarm: Battle stations, this is no drill.

* * *

Lovely word, 'karma,' the Naquib thought. Pity we don't have quite the equivalent in Islam. But it was karma, or Allah's will, that the infidel aircraft spotted us. Maybe I should have ordered that aircraft engaged. Maybe I did right in not ordering it engaged. I'll never know in this life. What I do know is we must attack now, even though the enemy is not in the optimal position for our ambush.

One hundred meters up a half choked inlet, al Naquib's boat wound its way through the maze of fallen logs and sand bars. To either side, he heard the distance-dissipated roar of large marine engines coming to life and doing likewise. He could not hear the motors of the half dozen boats on the other side of the Straits. Yet his chief assistant had told him they were likewise on the move.

Unseen and unheard by al Naquib, crews for the cruise missiles and torpedoes were frantically unmasking, activating their guidance systems, and preparing to fire. Hopefully they would launch in good time.

UEPF Spirit of Peace

'They're launching aircraft!' Robinson shouted. 'Why the fuck are they launching aircraft?'

It was true. It was more than true. Robinson had watched this ship, off and on, for months and he'd never