Terran Tomorrow

CHAPTER 15

Blatt… blatt… blatt blatt blatt…. Sirens in both domes sounded an attack. Zack hardly noticed. Deep in lab work, protected by the invulnerable domes, he didn’t need to react. Alerted by the signal station, the patrols would get everyone inside in time. A few more missiles would shatter themselves against one or both domes. If the signal station was hit, Jenner would erect a new one, as he had before. And nothing mattered as much as this lab work.

Susan had fallen into a v-coma as she sat by Caitlin’s bedside. Four more people had also gone down. Then had come a caesura, in which everybody had hoped the virophage had run its course, having infected everyone susceptible. All eighteen victims shared only one unique allele. Uninfected people had been tested, including the other four children who had played with Caitlin and Devon, as well as the research scientists. Zack did not possess the mutation, which by now they referred to simply as “the allele.”

Neither did Colonel Jenner.

“I think the epidemic is over,” a lab tech had said.

“Shut the fuck up,” Toni had snapped. “It’s not over until we bring them out of v-comas.”

To what? Zack wondered. But he only glared at Toni, before taking precious time away from work to pacify the lab tech. Still, Toni was right, even though having no further victims was a blessing.

Then there were more victims.

In the three weeks since Susan had fallen into a coma, so had three of the Settlers. They had arrived last at the base, which meant that they’d been easily infected, without long exposure. The evidence was at least predictive: If you had “the allele,” you fell into a coma. If you didn’t have it, you were infected with the virophage—probably they all were, by now—but you didn’t get your brain rewired by a microbe from antiquity.

All research on the vaccine, immune boosters, and gene drive had ceased. Zack hadn’t visited the bird lab in three weeks; all his time was spent in Lab Dome’s main facilities, researching the virophage. Presumably lab techs were still caring for the sparrows in the underground annex, but he no longer cared. All that mattered was finding a way to help Susan and Caity.

More and more of Lab Dome had become a hospital. Lieutenant Amy Parker, head nurse, had recruited Settlers to carry out the basic care of those in a coma, so that she and the trained nurses could keep the IVs delivering nutrients, monitor the v-comas, and nurse those still recovering from the destruction of the Settlement. All facilities and resources were strained almost as far as they could go. Meals had become mostly soup, and soup had become mostly fresh meat, dried vegetables, and seaweed. Last night Zack had dreamed of fresh raspberries with crème fraîche.

Blatt… blatt… blatt blatt blatt…

The experiments he was running told him nothing. For one thing, analyses of consecutive spinal taps from the same patient kept turning up new proteins. Zack could discover what the proteins were made of, he could discover how they reacted in solution with other substances, but he didn’t know what they were doing in a human brain. He didn’t know what inactive genes were being prompted to become active, other than the allele that had begun the metabolic cascades. He didn’t know how to wake up the v-coma victims, or what would happen when he did. He didn’t know anything.

“Dr. McKay,” a lab tech said.

He didn’t even look up to see which lab tech it was. “Ignore the sirens. The missiles can’t affect the domes.”

“It’s different this time.”

Then Zack did look up. “Who are you?”

“Ben Corrigan. Dr. Steffens assigned me to you. I’ve been assisting you for two days now.”

The man was clearly a Settler, sunburned and muscled and dressed in homespun. Yet he had prepared slides deftly and… yes, the notes on Zack’s tablet were clear and complete.

Corrigan said, “I was a high-school biology teacher. Before the Collapse.”

“And you joined Colin Jenner’s Settlement?”

“Yes.” Corrigan’s expression said he didn’t want to talk about it.

Blatt… blatt… blatt blatt blatt…

Corrigan winced. Zack said, “You’re a superhearer.” Victim of a different microbe, R. sporii. Corrigan’s brain had been rewired in the womb. Virus and virophage, enemies, had coevolved to make use of different parts of the same organ in their hosts, presumably in competition but with different effects.

“Yes, I’m a superhearer,” Corrigan said. “And whatever is going on out there, this attack is different.”

“Different how? What do you hear?”

“Ground and air—you know that already. There are large disturbances out there, and more coming.”

“The domes are impregnable to anything short of nuclear energy.”

Corrigan said nothing.

He had waited too long to act.

Jason watched helplessly from the command post as New America assaulted the base with weapons that he had not known still existed. The three F-35s emerged from the clouds and swept low overhead, dropping bombs. These exploded spectacularly against the dome’s energy shield, producing noise and fury but so far no damage except to the already charred forest beyond the perimeter. Although—what would happen if one of the jets flew a kamikaze mission directly into a dome? As far as Jason knew, that had never been tried.

The F-35s flew off, but they were not the main offensive.

Eight Strykers lumbered over the horizon, armored moving buildings. Each could hold eleven soldiers. The Strykers’ slat armor could withstand RPGs, and their ordnance, including the biggest guns ever fitted to this type of vehicle, could take out anything from a soft target to concrete bunkers. Jason had not known so many Strykers were left; there had been none at Sierra Depot. These had come overland from somewhere distant, plowing slowly through saplings and over rubble, skirting the ruins of cities. Where had the fuel come from? And did HQ know?

Jason couldn’t contact HQ, or anything else. The Strykers took positions facing all six airlocks and began firing. Any soldier who stepped outside to communicate with the signal station would be instantly reduced to a bloody pulp. After they had done trying out the Strykers’ ineffectual 105mms, the Strykers would simply wait in position, with New America’s troops bivouacking behind. Eventually Monterey Base, already low on food, would either starve or surrender. It was a siege, as if this were the thirteenth century and Monterey Base some medieval castle. But unlike thirteenth-century fortifications, the base had neither arrow slits and parapets from which to fire, nor rats to eat when the siege got too bad.

So it all came down to the tunnels from the annexes. New America would know the tunnels existed; all domes had one underground or underwater airlock. It was built into the incomprehensible alien design. But did they know where the base’s tunnels terminated? If so, a force would be waiting there. If not, they would have troops and snipers covering as much of the surrounding area as possible, waiting for someone to do what Jason had waited too long to do: get a message to the signal station to deploy the Return.

Assuming the signal station had not already been taken out.

Then, an added insult, a Bradley lumbered from the woods. A Monterey Base Bradley, the one that Jason and J Squad had abandoned to board the Return for the trip to Fort Hood.

Hillson came up behind him. “Sir.”

Jason didn’t answer. If he had carried out his plan before now, this might not have happened. If he hadn’t waited to attack Sierra Depot because he didn’t want to reveal to HQ that the Return was capable of more than he’d told Strople… if he hadn’t waited to see how many of his troops would be stricken with v-coma… if he hadn’t waited for definite orders…

“Sir…”

Jason turned from the ineffectual bombarding of his alien castle. “Do we have any intel about the signal station?”

“No, sir.”

“About the tunnels?”

“Captain Goldman listened at the exit. He didn’t hear anything, but that doesn’t mean squat. They’d wait quietly.”

“Send one of the superhearers with Goldman.”

“We don’t—”

“The Settlers have three of them, plus one kid.” Sergeant Tasselman had registered all the Settlers, with as much information as he could pry out of them.

Hillson didn’t convey his surprise, but a pleased look crept into his eyes. “Yes, sir. Permission to accompany the superhearer.”

“Permission granted.” Jason turned back to the clear dome. “Hillson, you ever fight in a Stryker?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Me, too.” Jason could almost feel the inside: hot metal, the stink of too many bodies in too tight a place, of urine and bad breath and ammo, the Congo jungle vivid on the view screen. But remembering the inside of a Stryker was better than remembering what the outside had done to an enemy village.

To Hillson he said, “The three adult superhearers are Sarah Waters, Colin Jenner, and Benjamin Corrigan. Take Corrigan.”

“Yes, sir.”

The bombing had stopped now. The Strykers sat motionless, waiting. Jason sent for and briefed Elizabeth Duncan. “Sir,” she said, “there’s no need to go yourself.”

“I’m going. Take command.”

“Sir—”

“That’s all, Major.”

Her expression didn’t waver. If she disapproved—and of course she did—it didn’t show. Once again, Jason marveled at her self-control. It was an admirable military trait, but it also made him uneasy. She would back him up on this counterattack, but how far would she back him up on a direct defiance of HQ? He wasn’t sure, which is why he hadn’t as yet told her his entire plan.

And, of course, she was right to disapprove of his going outside. He could have used any of J Squad to convey orders to Li, and Li would accept them. Impossible to explain to the hyper-correct Major Duncan why Jason had to go outside himself. He could barely explain it to himself. But this mess was his responsibility, and he was going to fix it.

Lindy’s voice in his head: You think you can control everything.

Uncharacteristically, Duncan tried again. “Permission to speak, sir.”

“Go ahead.”

“You should not go yourself. Sir. Send me.”

Was she offering a genuine strategic assessment, or was she starting to take control of J Squad? Jason suspected that what had happened at HQ had been a junta-style takeover. General Hahn had been killed or imprisoned by Strople, who had his own agenda for the war. Strople could not have done that without convincing control of HQ officers. Was it possible that Elizabeth Duncan also—

No. He was being paranoid.

He said to Duncan, “Dismissed, Major.”

She left. Half an hour later, Hillson returned. “Sir, Corrigan was in Lab Dome. One of the scientists found out he had some sort of biology background and they’re using him in research. Captain Goldman took him through the tunnels. He says he heard troops near the exits of both tunnels, but not directly above either exit.”

Shit. “Did he hear any heavy vehicles?” Not that Corrigan’s report would be conclusive. A Stryker could be in place already, quietly waiting. Or just heavy ordnance.

“No, sir. Sir, with all respect—you shouldn’t go yourself.”

Sometimes Hillson seemed to reach into Jason’s head and extract his thoughts. It could be very annoying.

Jason said. “If this doesn’t work, it won’t matter who goes. Not in the long run.”

No one would be left to care.

He waited until well after nightfall. In full armor, Jason was a walking metal can equipped with the best sighting, communications, and killing tech of ten years ago. The J Squad soldiers with him looked equally formidable. But if there was another Stryker waiting at the top of the tunnel, they would all be hamburger in five seconds.

The unit stood, helmets off, going through weapons check in the storeroom at the bottom of Enclave Dome staircase. Jason had chosen Enclave tunnel precisely because it was used more, bringing in supplies and game, and so more likely to be known to New America. They would expect him to use the Lab Dome tunnel exit, which they might or might not know the location of.

The storeroom smelled of onions, but there were too many empty crates around. It was October; ordinarily, Colin’s Settlement would be supplying pumpkins, apples, pears, late tomatoes. Not this year, and not ever again if this plan didn’t work.

Jason and Kandiss, the only members of J Squad who were not RSA survivors, activated esuits.

“Okay,” Jason said, “listen up.”

Zack dozed on a pallet in a corner of his lab. He was dreaming something formless but menacing when someone shook his shoulder, hard. Instantly he bolted upright and lashed out.

“Jesus, Zack, don’t assault me!”

Lindy Ross, crouching over him. Zack looked wildly around. No one else was in the lab, and only a dim night light burned.

“What the hell are you doing, Lindy? What time is it? What’s happened?” Fear spitted his guts.

“It’s not Caitlin or Susan,” she said quickly. “It’s midnight. I need your help.”

“My help?”

“Yes. I have to move Colin Jenner and I can’t do it alone.”

That made no sense. “What? Move him where? You want an orderly.” And then, “Is he dead?”

“No, he’s not dead. I can’t move him alone with his injuries and tubes unless I use a carry-bot, which can’t go down stairs.”

“Down stairs? Why would Colin go down any stairs?” Was Lindy delusional?

“I’ll explain later but I need help now, while I can do this in secret, and you’re the only one I trust. Come on!”

She tugged on his arm, and Zack rose, befuddled by sleep or its lack but responding to the authority and urgency in her tone. They moved swiftly through the artificially night-dimmed corridors to the infirmary. When Zack tried to whisper a question, Lindy put her finger to her lips.

Colin Jenner waited in a powerchair. Lindy whispered to Zack, “If we run into anybody, say that you need tissue samples from Colin for your research. Come on.”

They moved, a silent ghostly group, past the cubicles with v-comas, who were beyond hearing anything. God, so many of them! From a side room came night nurses’ voices, weary and yet strident, arguing about something. Beyond the infirmary, the corridors were empty. They went through the first door to the tiny enclosure at the top of the staircase, Lindy squeezing in Colin’s bulky chair. She closed the door behind them.

Zack said, “Are we going down to the bird lab? Why? And where’s the guard?”

“Went comatose a few hours ago. Zack, you can get down there. Give the security system your scans.”

“Not until you tell me what’s going on!”

Colin said, “I’ll tell you. The underground annex will have a small airlock and then a long tunnel to the outside, as an emergency escape hatch and—”

“I know that, Jenner!”

“What you don’t realize is that there’s a whole New America army camped all around us, with tanks or something like tanks, and—”

“How do you know?”

“I looked,” Lindy said. “Observation deck is off-limits now, but I’m a doctor. With a good enough story, soldiers let me go places they won’t let other people go.”

“And anyway, I hear them,” Colin said.

Of course. Zack hadn’t put it together. If Ben Corrigan could hear “something different out there,” so could Colin Jenner.

Lindy said, “We’re going to take Colin through the tunnel to its exit somewhere in the woods. We need you because you have security clearances for the airlock scanner—you’ve gone outside to obtain sparrows. Colin’s going to listen to find out whether there are New America troops right above, waiting for us to come out like rats from a burning sewer. If not, I’m going outside and try to call the signal station. I have an earplant and mic, you know—doctor’s privilege. Mine aren’t military but maybe the signal station will hear us. Otherwise, there’s no way to tell them what’s going on.”

Zack was appalled. “New America will hear your message, too. They’ll pick up your location instantly.”

“I’ll walk a long way from the tunnel exit before I signal.”

“Lindy, they’ll mow you down!”

Lindy said, “Help me with Colin’s chair. We can’t jiggle him too much.” She took off her long white coat. Under it she wore a jacket, military pants, and boots. An assault rifle was strapped across her chest.

Zack said “And even if you reached the signal station, what good could they do?”

“Send missiles. Jason can’t fire outside, and we’re just sitting here like caged sparrows in the bird lab. And if the signal station can’t fire missiles, they can at least send the Return to rescue us.”

“No,” Zack said. “It’s an insane plan.”

Lindy moved so close to him that their feet almost touched. Her eyes, inches away, bored into his. He smelled her musky female odor, overlaid with smells from the old jacket. “Let me tell you what’s insane, Dr. McKay. It’s insane that my ex-husband didn’t foresee this. I would verbally flay him up one side and down the other except that I know beyond a grain of doubt that he’s already doing that to himself. It’s insane that New America found antique weapons that what is left of the entire United States Army didn’t find, or at least didn’t find here. It’s insane that we live in structures we didn’t build, don’t understand, and can’t alter by so much as a molecule. It’s insane that the only way the formerly greatest military machine on Earth can only communicate with itself is through one lousy comsat or else with human signalers through one relay station, like a nineteenth-century telegraph office. It’s insane that New America can hold us in a state of siege until we either starve, or all fall into v-comas, or start eating our comatose patients, whichever comes first. All those things are insane. Getting a signal to the Return so they can rescue us is the only thing not insane.”

Rescue—how? All at once Zack realized that Lindy had lied. She was keeping secrets. Colin Jenner probably believed the Return, which had conveyed him unconscious from the Settlement to the base, was going to swoop down and carry everyone off to safety. Lindy knew that the order would be to bomb the hell out of New America and everything else in a mile’s radius.

Or did Colin know that, too, and was still willing to help Lindy even to the point of her own death?

And how long could the overcrowded, underprovisioned domes hold out without food coming in from the forest or Colin’s Settlement?

Zack closed his eyes, opened them, and began easing Colin’s chair down the steep, narrow stairwell.

Kubetschek took point. J Squad moved through the airlock that the “super-aliens,” whoever the hell they’d been, had designed, and into the bot-bored tunnel beyond. A generation ago, on the Embassy, the analog of this airlock had served as a submarine bay under New York Harbor. In Colin’s Settlement, it had led to a wide tunnel that slanted sharply upward to bring in stored crops. In domes used as Army bases, the tunnels went downward first so they could be more deeply buried, and were fortified with steel and concrete.

Jason walked directly behind Mason Kandiss. The only light came from their helmets, and the Ranger was a huge dark silhouette. They all moved quietly, but if New America was above them, and if they had among them a superhearer, then the enemy knew what Jason was doing. No way to calculate the odds.

At the end of the tunnel, Kubetschek and Goldman mounted the stairs. The others covered them from shallow alcoves built into the tunnel walls. However, that wouldn’t help much if strong enough explosives came down from above.

Goldman tapped in the code to open the hatch. The old, familiar tension tautened the base of Jason’s skull.

The two men touched the mechanism that raised the heavy, camouflaged hatch at the top of the stairwell.

It made a shocking amount of noise as soil, bushes, small rocks slid off the rising hatch. Dirt and pebbles clattered down the stairs, mixed with fat droplets of rain. But no larger noise of enemy fire. Kubetschek sprang through the hatch, followed by the other three members of J Squad. They took up defensive positions while Jason, at the top of the stairs, spoke urgently into his mic to the comsat somewhere above.

“Signal station, come in—code red, repeat code red!”

“Signal station here,” Li said, sounding startled. “Sir?”

“Execute Operation Flamingo in five minutes. Repeat, execute Operation Flamingo… verification code Delta Whiskey Alpha. Repeat, Delta Whiskey Alpha.”

A bullet whizzed past his helmet.

Instantly Kandiss was firing. Goldman covered Jason’s body with his own as he shoved him back down the stairwell. Jason yelled, “Go! Go!” and all of them scrambled through the hatch, followed by a torrent of rain splashing down the steps. Goldman stayed to lock the hatch as the rest of them ran back through the tunnel.

Something heavy rumbled overhead.

A sniper… the stray bullet had come from a sniper, but more of the New America force had not been that far away. And now they knew where the hatch was.

Ten minutes. They had maybe ten minutes…

Boots rang staccato on the metal plates of the tunnel floor. Behind Jason, Goldman pounded along until he caught up to the others. The tunnel was wide enough for only three raggedly abreast.

Go, go, go… ten minutes. He didn’t know what would happen if they were still in the tunnel when the Return dropped down from orbit.

In the other dome, Zack and Lindy bumped Colin’s powerchair down the steps, one at a time. Colin winced but didn’t cry out. “Christ,” Lindy said, “you’d think the Army would have sprung for powerchairs that can climb up and down steps!”

Zack puffed, “You don’t want… my opinion… on what the Army chooses to spend on or… not.” God, he was out of shape. Lindy was lifting and hauling easier than he was. “Jenner, you okay?”

“Yes.”

“I’m trying to not… sorry!… Okay, we’re down.”

“That’s the airlock and decon to the tunnel,” Lindy said, unnecessarily. “Zack, scan it open and then you stay here.”

“I’m an RSA survivor and—”

“We don’t need you. Colin will listen at the tunnel hatch, and if it’s safe, I’ll go out and contact the signal station.”

“This whole idea looks stupider now that I consider it.”

“Good, I’m glad you think so, because you’re not participating any farther than this. Just wait on this side of the airlock to help with Colin’s chair after we get back.”

“If there’s a hatch, what makes you think you can lift it alone?”

“It will have hydraulics.”

“Do you know that for sure? You don’t. And, Lindy—what if there’s a code to open the hatch?”

“There is. I know it.”

Zack didn’t ask how. She’d been married to Jenner; she could have been told, or have stolen, any number of supposedly restricted things. He said, “I don’t think you should—”

“Zack, now!”

Zack put his eye and finger to the scanner. It said, “Retinal scan and digital chip match. Dr. Zachary McKay.” The airlock/decon chamber slid open.

Colin powered himself inside behind Lindy and raised his hand to the CLOSE DOOR button. The door closed.

Zack sagged against the wall. Would he ever see either of them alive again? And if Lindy succeeded in this mad scheme to alert the signal station, would either the soldiers there or the Return act without orders from Colonel Jenner? In fact, could anybody even pilot the Return now that Branch Carter was in a v-coma?

Spaceship, Monterey Base, signal station—each locked separately, unable to reach the others except by desperate measures, no better than the caged sparrows in the bird lab. Was this any way to run a war?

Decon could not be rushed, but without decontaminating everyone, RSA would win. They all went through the decon process at once, a tight fit for so many bodies. Jason counted each agonizing minute, squashed against Goldman and Kandiss. Kandiss’s AR-15 jammed into Jason’s side.

When decon was done and the airlock finished cycling, they exploded into Enclave Dome’s storage area.

Thirty seconds. They’d made it with thirty seconds to spare.

Zack couldn’t see Lindy and Colin—why didn’t the airlock have some sort of wall screen to the tunnel beyond? Or something like that? Or—

The world shook and screamed and threatened to break apart.

Zack threw himself into the airlock and slammed his fist onto the DOOR CLOSE button. Another explosion shook everything—an earthquake? Now? It seemed long minutes before the airlock opened on the other side. Colin, the superhearer, sat just beyond the airlock with his hands pressed tightly to his ears; tears made trails through the dirt on his face. But he cried out to Zack, “Get her out!”

Lindy lay a short distance along the tunnel, which rained dirt and stone from gaps between the sagging ceiling plates. Zack grabbed Lindy, who was conscious but looked dazed—had she hit her head? She screamed when he grabbed her under her armpits and dragged her, but Zack had no choice. If that had been an earthquake, there could be aftershocks and the entire tunnel could collapse. He shoved Lindy into the airlock, closed the door—thank the gods that it still closed—and pushed START DECON. Come on, come on…

Decon hadn’t finished when everything shook again. But the airlock was part of the original alien structure and didn’t crack. Lindy moaned. Zack said, his voice too loud and too shaky, “Earthquake!”

“No,” Colin gasped.

No? Then what?

“Bombs.”

Whose? Did New America have those kinds of weapons? The dome had held… but what if it didn’t go on holding?

Lindy moaned again. Then silence.

Jason said into his mic, “Major Duncan?”

“Operation Flamingo successfully executed, sir.”

“On our way up.”

J Squad, too disciplined to cheer, nonetheless looked as if they were hallooing and slapping each other on the back and high-fiving. But there was only Goldman saying, “Well done, sir.”

They climbed to dome level and dispersed to stations per the OPORD. Jason, ignoring the frightened civilians—J Squad would explain and reassure—climbed to the command post and looked out through night-vision goggles.

The Return, its mission finished, had already lifted back to orbit. The bombs it had dropped, the most powerful nonnuclear weapons ever developed, had incinerated everything around both domes in a quarter-mile radius. In the eerie night-vision green, the scene was something from a nightmare. Forest burned, although the thickening rain would take care of that. It was already bringing down the dust and smoke of the carnage. The twisted metal of Strykers gleamed wetly. Debris lay everywhere, along with what was left of bodies. It would take days to clean up everything and refortify the tunnels.

Jason had gambled that the domes themselves could withstand the ordnance. The bombs had been experimental ten years ago; no one knew how powerful they still were. Now Jason knew. The Return would be back at first light. This job was only half finished.

He wasn’t going to report to HQ until it was. Strople wasn’t going to stop him.

Colin said shakily, “Can you get Lindy up the stairs? You can leave me here and put her in the chair!”

“No,” Zack said. “I don’t dare move her any more without a doctor—I have no idea where she’s hurt. I’m going for help.”

Lindy quavered, “I’m a doctor, I—” but Zack was already sprinting up the stairs. At the top, he found himself unable to unlock the door at the top. Christ!

Colin called, “What is it?”

“The door isn’t recognizing me—I don’t know why not!” It must have something to do with the earthquake, or bombs, or whatever the fuck had happened. He pounded on the door with his fist; nothing happened.

Colin called, “Come back down. She has an implanted mic and earplant.”

Of course she did. Cursing himself for an idiot—Colin, who eschewed technology, had remembered the mic and implant and Zack had not—he sprinted back down the stairwell. He bent over Lindy. She was speaking in short gasps, her voice full of pain. “Jason… help me… Lab tunnel… please…”

“Lindy, no—Jenner will be over in Enclave Dome, he can’t hear you! Call someone else…”

But someone heard. Maybe the mic, or the frequency, was tuned to more than just Jenner. A few long minutes later multiple footsteps pounded down the stairwell. Claire Patel said, “What happened?” at the same moment that an Army sergeant thundered, “What the fuck are you people doing down here?”

Zack wished he had a good answer. He no longer knew.

Anything.