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Sconces blackened the sweating walls with smoke and cast dim light on the padded sawhorse and the naked body strapped to it. Tawny skin, ass pointing in the air, scar zigzagging his brow, depravity in his eyes. Why was the Imago restrained?

Latex fingers pinched my arm then I was flying toward the dog crate. The steel-toed punch in my back propelled me across the threshold. I curled at the rear of the cage to avoid the next kick. The gate shut and the padlock snicked, giving me a moment’s freedom from his jumpy boots.

“What do you want?”

The Drone poked a stray curl into his cap. “Allah’s chosen.”

“What does that mean?” But I already knew.

“A master race. Human adherents of Islam.” His eyes sparkled with delusional dreams.

I fought the scream out of my voice. “When you created the virus to wipe out the heretics, starting with American women, were nymphs part of that design?”

I couldn’t bring myself to look at the horror hanging from the ceiling.

He circled the spanking bench and rested a gloved palm in the spread of his brother’s butt cheeks. “Yes. I chose the aphid genome for its adaptive reproductive abilities.” He fingered the trembling cleft. “Did you know an aphid can create eggs or live nymphs depending on its environment?”

I lifted a stiff shoulder as his probing finger pulled a gurgled choke from the Imago.

Homosexuality didn’t faze me, but incest and rape? The tongue-less protest wrung my stomach and roused a memory from the hall. Roark’s abused nipples. The Drone’s lingering touches. What if the doctor lied about no visitors in his cell? Bile resurfaced. I would do more than slice out his tongue.

A middle finger crammed past the ring of muscle that protected the Imago’s bowels. “I created an evolutionary breed of female hosts. Seeding them with my family blood will ensure a pristine race.”

The whacko had exterminated the human species to repopulate it himself. Yet, he rutted on men. And given the bruising around the Imago’s rectum, he rutted often. Boy, was that a kink in his plan.

The nymph’s moan saturated the room. Movement bubbled her bloated belly, a gruesome reminder that his plan was already in place.

Seeding them with my family blood.

The Imago didn’t share his brother’s sexual preference. I’d bet my carbine that nymph impregnation was in his job description. “How does one man repopulate the world?”

His mouth parted as he pumped his finger. Butt muscles quivered in the Imago’s effort to press them together.

He withdrew his hand. “I isolated specific aphid species. Those that have telescoping generations.” He stripped the gloves, donned a new pair and caught the blank look on my face. “It is the ability to carry a daughter within the womb, one who is also pregnant with a daughter. Additionally, the humanoid nymph has a four-week gestation and swift healing. Now you see how I can manufacture Allah’s chosen race.”

The turbulence in my gut was merciless. “Sounds like a race of inbred retards rife with genetic disorders.”

A charged current arced between us. “Weak recessive traits will be weeded out.”

“Take out the weak and there’ll be nothing left.”

His boot crashed into the cage, denting the bars. “You will not disrespect my family.”

“I’ll make sure all future disrespect is for you alone.” I was begging him to unleash. Brimming with my own need to lose it, I wanted those soulless eyes within clawing distance.

He grabbed the padlock and fumbled with the dial.

“What happens when all the mammals on this planet have been consumed and the blood runs out? What will your divine race sink its teeth into then?”

His hands stilled. “Allah’s chosen race will not drink the blood of mortals. I am perfecting the genetics.”

“Perfecting what genetics? You mean trial and error?”

All at once, he stormed to the back wall and stooped over a dark mound, hands digging through shapeless blobs. Fleshy smacks and revived decay filled the air. A baby’s cry escaped the pile and tip-toed up my spine.

He flung something at the cage. It clipped the bars and flopped to the floor.

“Look closely, Eveline. Look at the abomination.”

Heart pounding, I leaned forward. A tiny genderless body curled on its side. A bony leg angled backwards, jerking. Small wet noises crept from a fanged mouth. The human chest deflated. The spasms ceased.

I buckled over and buried my mouth in my shoulder. A succession of gagging pushed through. “This child’s not any less human than you.”

He charged the cage and kicked the baby across the room. Bones cracked when it hit the wall. My heart cracked with it.

“You are the key to fix this.”

His DNA was altered with aphid and spider genomes. Didn’t that make him the very thing he considered unworthy of survival? If the doctor were there, would he have defended that shit?

A pinch yanked my gut, like a hook on a line. I followed it to the torment strung to the ceiling. She didn’t move, but her soul flickered and clung to me. I embraced the connection. The beat of her heart fell in sync with mine. Then it slowed. The thread between us snapped. Energy scattered through the room and dissipated.