8. Bilara's Letter

As the soldiers knocked on his door, around midnight, Bitz already felt the grave news they’d bring in his heart.

He had fled in the same car as the commander. Something only the real important animals were allowed to do. He lived close enough to the front line that he could see the campfires of the Godesweets through his window. Sometimes he heard them laugh or even play music.

He’d never hated the enemy as much as he did now.

How dare they have fun? How dare they pretend they were friends? Friends did not exist, not when you were a Jurad. He’d finally reached this place at the top of the ladder, and then Bilara … and then she …

Sitting in his living room, the commander rapidly drew up new battle plans. Bitz had repurposed the rest of his home as his new laboratory, which worked tirelessly to produce as much gas as possible. The first machines they’d made helped tremendously. They produced the work of a hundred chemists, in less time. Fortunately, the rest of the process still had to be done manually.

The soldiers took off their helmets, but kept to the doorway. Their shadows crept over Bitz’ workspace, making it hard to see which flask he was holding.

“Your wife … Bilara … she is …”

“You’re in my light.”

The soldiers—a mix of ferrets, beavers, and animals he hadn’t seen before—looked to each other for assurance. “Sir? Did you not hear us? Your—”

“Disappear!”

The only other light came from flashing yellow light bulbs and flasks containing some fluorescent material. Bitz seemed a monster in that light, a shriveled dwarf hiding deeper and deeper in his hole, afraid of the light. Only his eyes and teeth, and perhaps his glasses, sometimes flashed.

The soldiers disappeared, except one. He still held his helmet in front of his belly. He cried and could barely speak Bilara’s name.

“The commander would understand if you want to take time off. To grieve your wife. Time to take her back home. The plan can be delayed.”

“The plan will be executed! Tell the commander that. Tomorrow we gas our enemies, stealing their breath from the first to the last.”

“Your … prisoners have escaped. They have plundered the laboratory. Perhaps the secret of the gas is already in the hands of the enemy.”

Bitz smashed a flask to pieces on the ceramic floor. “What do you want!?”

“If you use the gas … there is no way back. They’ll do the same to you. You know how cruel the gas is—would you wish another the same fate? Another soldier? Your children? A friend?”

Bitz unfurled his paws. He held crumpled paper, Bilara’s elegant handwriting still visible here and there. A friend.

What friend?

Tears formed. The feeling was unfamiliar to him. He was supposed to grow old with Bilara, his childhood love. Her letter confirmed she really hated him those final days. Hated him like he hated the enemy now, but somehow even worse.

She never wanted war. She wanted a return to academics, to invent with him. Her letter talked about winning the Knobbel Prize—no higher aim for a scientist than that. The prize rewarded the best invention each year, with fame, money, everything.

Now his invention stood on the precipice of escalating this war. His wife was no more.

Which wife?

He stood and stepped in the light. He met the soldier’s gaze.

He was no ferret. And no beaver. His face didn’t even look familiar. Was he even a Freethieves soldier? And that uniform, wasn’t that used in that Nine Years War before pirates appeared?

“Who are you?”

“Just a friendly sun badger asking you to please reconsider.”

He sounded like his wife. He didn’t want to be reminded of his wife.

Bitz grabbed an iron poke of which the tip was searing hot and lay on a heater. He swung it forward like a sword, as he yelled towards the other room.

“Spy! Burglar! Help!”

The sun badger put on his helmet and trudged away. Not afraid, not hurried, not disappointed, just deeply sorrowful.

“Why can’t I just kill him, Ismaraldah?” he asked … nobody. Bitz thought he might be talking to the dark night sky. “That would solve everything, right? Gosheliegosh, everything is so difficult with you.”

A buzzing sound. The commander stormed the laboratory, joined by his highest generals. They ran outside to see a large, circular wooden object appear out of nowhere.

The sun badger stepped inside.

“Or maybe I could kidnap him? A simple time abduction? I’ll send him back to the time of the dinosaurs or something, and he won’t be able to do any harm.”

“No,” said a female voice. The door closed and Bitz could not eavesdrop on the conversation any longer. The object vanished as quickly as it came.

“I want something like that,” the commander said. “Think you can invent that?”

“I am a chemist, not a wizard.”

Suddenly it was all so clear. Bitz had sacrificed his life at a chance for glory. It was a serious task, every day, not to be taken lightly.

But everyone else? They saw war as a game. Their high rank as a given. Tanks and weapons and countless deaths were just a toy to entertain them.

He’d invented fertilizer and prevented a Great Starvation, and it still wasn’t enough.

He would never get back his old life. He’d chosen his path and he would walk it until the end.

He straightened his glasses, ran to his laboratory, and asked for even more gas cylinders.

A few hours later the early birds started their songs. Bitz had calmed down and was completely immersed in the work. This gas would change the war, it was going to work, and he’d be the savior of his homeland. In his mind’s eye, status of him and his Knobbel Prize had already been erected.

A trumpet woke up the camp.

What? At this hour? An unhelpful mistake?

The trumpet sounded again, louder this time. The first doors opened as sleepy faces asked what was going on.

Only one possible answer: the Godesweets attacked.

The soldiers rapidly formed lines. Bitz ran outside holding a simple flag in his hands.

The wind was blowing the right way. Away from the Freethieves, to the Godesweets. They didn’t need to fear the gas blowing back in their own faces.

Bitz laughed, louder and louder. The Godesweets were walking into their own trap! With open eyes!

God wanted it to be this way, this was a sure sign. God supported his cause.

The gas cylinders were distributed. The soldiers were told, several times, to not enter the battle field themselves under any circumstance. They had to pretend to fight, but safely stay behind the gas.

The cylinders were placed. A row almost a kilometer in length, with consistent gaps in-between.

The Godesweets were close enough to recognize their faces. They yelled and accelerated, probably certain of victory.

Bitz gave the signal.

The cylinders opened. A green-yellow fog crawled over the battle field, carried by the wind, as gas masks were distributed among the Freethieves.

The Godesweets did not have those.