Prometheus and the Dragon (Atlas and the Winds Book 2) (40 page)

“That’s great news,” she said, sticking her hand out and shaking his vigorously. “Did you hear that?” she turned to face the others. “He’s the President of the Colony now.”

“Actually, I’m called the Chancellor, but that’s close enough,” he grinned. It took him almost another ten minutes to extricate himself from the people who wanted to ask him questions or congratulate him. He learned, before he got free, there was a horrendous lack of factual information among those who had just arrived. He made a mental note to address the issue as soon as he returned from the Unity Conference.

Susan Winslow and General Marquez stood waiting for him at the doorway to the docking facility. “We were about to send a search party,” she said. “Did you have trouble finding your way?”

“Nah, I just had to deal with my adoring fans,” he said, looking out the small observation port toward where the
Freedom
and
Liberty
sat, strange and out of place on the regolith. The two winged orbiters looked all wrong sitting in the dust. “When did they get here?” he asked.

“Last night,” Susan said. “The
Lynx
brought them down on her last flight yesterday. Both dropships are coming on this trip from Earth. After they’re unloaded, we’ve got two more orbiters that’ll be brought down. The rest of the fleet will be here within the next few days.”

“They’re actually flying them to the moon?” he asked. “Why?”

“There’s a lot of very expensive hardware sitting out there,” Marquez explained. “It’s all stuff we’ll probably salvage over the years, even if the ships themselves aren’t useful here. It’s not a problem to store them in the vacuum, and it’s a lot better than leaving them behind.”

“And with the hemorrhagic virus spreading down there ...” he said, letting the thought trail off.

“What’s the latest on that?” the General asked, opening the door to the boarding ramp to their transport.

“It’s bad,” he said, following them into the connecting tube. “We’ve lost touch with our people in north-eastern Italy. The NATO Base at Aviano closed last night. The hospital staff held out until sometime this morning, but we’ve got no reports from anyone. CDC says all of Europe will be dead within the week.”

“I’m sure the Unity Colony has started refusing personnel from the European launch centers,” Susan said.

“I hope so, or this is going to be a very short-lived conference,” Marquez said.

***

Stormhaven:

“That’s the last of it,” Daryl said, sweating in spite of the coolness of the room. “We’ve got a few hours to get her wired in, then we’ll restart her core functions and let her handle it from there.”

“Just keep an eye on the clock,” Tom said. “Those bastards are building up fast out there.”

“Don’t you think I fucking know that?” Daryl barked, exhaustion sharpening his tongue to the point where he bit it to stop himself from shouting. “Sorry, I know you’re just as worried as I am. I’m doing everything I can.”

“I know, I’m sorry too,” Tom said. “I’ll stay out of your way, just let me know when she’s up and running.”

He walked out onto the balcony of the power center and looked up at the dark grey sky. The normal pale blue of the Biome had been replaced with a coating of polymer concrete. It was one of those things Mica had suggested they do to increase the survival potential of the community. It was uglier than the Kevlar had been, but it was probably a lot more resilient. One of Daryl’s robots had been pressed into service coating the roof, and a few hours ago it had finished the job. So instead of blue skies, Stormhaven now hung under eternal overcast.

All the doors had been armored with mono-carbon, and the only remaining access from the outside world had been equipped with a bank of gravity lasers. The community had become a stronghold. A fortress. It wasn’t pretty anymore, but it was as solid as they could make it.

Tom’s cell phone beeped. They had no internal communications with Mica offline, so they’d had to resort to phones. It felt strange not to be able to just ask for someone and have them on the other end of a conversation in an instant.

“Tom here,” he said, flipping the switch on his headset.

“Yeah, Mr. Stevens, I’m up here at the west laser turret,” the voice said in his ear. “We’ve got some activity you need to come check out.”

“What’s happening?” he asked, heading up the stairs to the top level.

“Sommerset’s got himself a pep rally going on. He’s up on top of his trailer, waving and screaming at the crowd. Looks like he’s trying to get them fired up for a fight,” the guard said.

“Crap. Mica’s still down. Let’s get everyone on deck just in case they decide to make their move,” he said. “I’ll let Cole know what’s up, then I’ll be out there to take a look.”

He spun around and dropped the five flights of stairs at almost a dead run. Fortunately, he thought as he stumbled onto the balcony, Cole’s apartment wasn’t all the way across the floor of the Biome. He beat on the door for several seconds before it swung inward. A wall of boxes blocked his view inside, and the lights were off in the main room. A faint glow came from the back room. “Cole are you in here?” he called out, staring across the chaos toward the open bedroom door.

“In here,” Cole said, his voice sounding more lifeless than it had after Glen’s death.

He pushed his way through the room like an icebreaker. Boxes threatened to topple from a horizontal surface that might have once been a computer console, and he shoved them back a little, listening to things creak and crunch. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what he’d just crushed.

“We’ve got a problem,” he said, stopping at the doorway. Colton lay sprawled on the bed staring up at the ceiling. He looked like he hadn’t slept or eaten in days.

“You deal with it,” he said, not looking toward his friend.

“I’ve been dealing with everything while you lay here wallowing in your self-indulgent pity pool,” Tom said, snapping. “You’ve got to get off your ass or we’re all fucked.”

Cole rolled on his side and focused his eyes on Tom. “I’ve made so many mistakes. You need to carry things from here. I don’t think I can be trusted to think anymore,” he said.

“Bullshit Cole, we wouldn’t have made it this far if it hadn’t been for you.” Tom stepped over to the side of the bed and grabbed his friend by the shoulders to pull him to his feet. “You need to keep moving. You can’t give up on me now.”

“No.” He shook his head, settling back onto his bed again. Tom knelt down in front of him.

“Have you eaten?” he asked. “Or had anything to drink?” Cole shrugged.

“We have to get you some food,” he said, looking around the room for something he could feed him. Anything. He walked out to the front room again and frowned. If there was anything out here that might have once been edible, it was long since entombed in layers of detritus. “How do you live like this,” he muttered, grabbing his cell out of his pocket and calling Shapiro.

“Doug, I’m in Cole’s apartment. I need your help,” he said.

“Sure, I’m on my way,” Shapiro said.

“Bring a doctor if you can find one.” He flipped the toggle, ending the call.

“I want you to promise me something,” Cole said. He was standing in the doorway, leaning against the jamb.

“Anything,” he said, grabbing his arm and helping him into a chair.

“These are my journals,” he said, gesturing with his arm to include the mountains of boxes stacked around the room. “Make sure they get to the colony. It’s important that you understand what I’ve tried to do here.”

“No problem. We’ll load them today,” he promised.

“And my guitars.” He nodded at the cases by the door. “Nikki needs to have them.”

“Jesus, Cole. You sound like you’re reciting your Last Will and Testament,” Tom said, feeling fear explode inside him. “You’re going with us when we leave.”

Cole focused on Tom and said nothing, a tear leaking from the corner of his eye. “Not this time,” he said, closing his eyes.

“The hell you aren’t,” Tom promised. “If it’s the last thing I do, I’m not letting you fold. You’re playing this hand out to the end.”

***

Lunagrad, Boscovich Crater:

Faruq al Hassien didn’t like the cards that he’d been dealt, nor had he enjoyed telling his people they were being exiled from the colony they’d helped build. It wasn’t the first time they’d been turned out into the desert, even if this one was far more harsh than any they’d ever imagined. Unlike the huge craters that the Chinese and the Americans occupied, this crater wasn’t large enough to allow for two colonies to coexist.

Now, with the moment at hand, his people were still against him. He’d expected as much, but given the alternatives, there was little else they could do. They’d loaded the three domes they’d been given onto a trailer and headed out. On a second trailer they carried a portable air recycler and enough spare air tanks to last several days, or even a week. A caravan of exactly two vehicles, plus a hundred walking men, stretched out toward the western wall of the crater.

They’d set their course out of the smaller crater that was the actual Lunagrad colony site toward the only place where there appeared to be a pass. It was going to be a difficult climb, but once they got to the top, they’d be able to make some serious distance before they had to start looking for a new home. The sun was still more than a week from setting, and there were several rille structures to the south-west where they might find a small outcropping that could provide shelter for their new settlement.

Once they were established, the plan was to return with the rovers to pick up the larger garden dome and the rest of their workers. Within a month, they hoped to be self-sufficient and able bring their families to join them. It had taken a lot more trust to leave their wives and children with the Russians than they actually had, but once again, they had no choice. Allah would watch over them and protect them until they returned.

Starting out, they’d agreed not to talk amongst themselves except as necessary until they were out of radio range of Lunagrad. The silence hung between them, widening the gulf within their hearts into an impenetrable chasm into which their frustration fell like a torrential rain.

Four hours into their march, they reached the base of the crater wall. It had been a gradual climb for the last hour, but now they’d arrived at the point where boulders the size of apartment buildings had tumbled down from above. The pass turned out to be nothing more than a fractured chimney, eight hundred feet high. The rubble that had rolled out had made the slope look more gradual from a distance than it actually was.

“This is impossible,” the driver of the large rover said

“How much cable do we have with us?” Hassien asked, climbing from the roof of the rover and walking backwards while he considered the escarpment.

“Probably not more than a hundred meters,” the driver said.

“Assam, bring the cable and join me,” he said. “I have an idea.”

Another two hours of hard labor and they had created a flat that could be used as a staging area. Two boulders had been moved, and the resulting ledge was large enough to park the rovers. Another ledge protruded above their new position, and once they’d managed to get everyone up to the first landing, several men had moved on to the next one.

Nine hours and five landings later, they emerged at the top of the rim, exhausted, hungry, and sore. All of the men were into their second bottle of air, and several were already working on their third before they set up the small shelter that would allow a few of them at a time to open up their helmets and eat. They’d still be sleeping in their suits, but at least they could take a few minutes to refill their water reserves and breathe some air that didn’t smell like their own urine.

Faruq declined to eat, preferring to wait until the end of the rotation. The men who had consumed the most air went first, and everyone else’s turns were assigned accordingly. Even though his air use was about average, he passed his turn over, preferring to sit and stare back across the crater from which they had escaped. Far in the distance he could see the shining white dots of several new domes that had gone up since they’d left. He knew they were new buildings, even at this distance, because they were not yet covered with regolith. The rest of Lunagrad was invisible.

“Graves for the infidels,” he said, listening to his own voice echo around inside his helmet. He turned his back on them and gazed to the south. Somewhere out there they would make their new home. An oasis in an unfathomable, absolute wasteland.

***

Chapter Twenty-Six:

The Thinnest of Margins

Cape Canaveral, Florida:

Cecelia Lange stood in the huge steel hangar, surrounded by several hundred of the last NASA employees left on Earth, holding the hands of her two children while they watched the dropships being rigged for transport. The cargo boxes, almost always part of the
Lynx
, had been left behind on the last lunar transit, leaving room to attach the shuttle carriers.