The Dying of the Light: Interval (6 page)

And all at once, she had it. “Potter, pull up the motion sensors on the mountain and pipe that through to the monitors in the Tower.” Potter nodded and began repeating her orders to the technicians who were already moving to comply. “Gunny, reposition for coverage of the mountain just above the main road.”

“Roger, repositioning now,” he replied.

“What are you thinking?” asked the governor.

“This is just a diversion. Beoshane’s not stupid; he knows we’d make mincemeat of his guys and his vehicles. I think he’s going to try climbing.”

“Contacts!” said one of the Ops technicians. “Four man-sized objects moving slowly up the mountain, ma’am.”

“Gunny?”

“One sec, ma’am. Almost ready… Got ‘em. Connecting video feed now.”

Kim motioned to Potter, who put the feed from the Gunnery Sergeant’s rifle-mounted camera up on a spare monitor. It took a second for her to find them, as the climbers were heavily camouflaged, but she finally counted all four.

“Permission to engage, ma’am?”

“Permission granted, Gunny. Fire at will.”

The video on the monitor jumped once, twice, four times as Gaines fired. Each time, there was a splash of dark red on the mountainside, and then all the climbers lay still.

“Movement from the convoy, ma’am,” said Reynolds. “Looks like they’re pulling back.”

“Confirmed,” said David. “And Beoshane does
not
look happy. He just shot one of the guys in his truck.”

Kim glanced at the monitors surveying the situation. “All enemy forces appear to be in retreat.” She turned to Potter. “Stand down the Blackhawk and Bravo team and cancel the alert. Once the hostiles are confirmed gone, get a maintenance team out to those guns—I want them re-armed and ready to go in case they come back. Take a security team, just in case. They may have left some surprises behind.”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Potter. “And what about the wreckage, ma’am? And the bodies of the climbers?”

“Leave it all. We can always move it if we need to, but for right now it serves a better purpose.”

“Ma’am?”

Kim sighed and turned away, moving towards the elevator. “It’s a reminder, Captain. A reminder not to fuck with the people who live here. Can you think of a better one?”

Chapter Three

McMurdo Station
Two years later; Z-Day + 3 years

Major Bill Shaw rubbed his eyes and leaned back in his chair in the conference room… but not too far. He still remembered the spill he’d taken last week when he overextended that lean, and even though the only thing bruised was his ego, it was enough to remind him to be more careful.

Any injury could kill you, down at the bottom of the world.

He glanced over at Marshal Jennifer Michaelson, sitting next to him in the conference room but more than three thousand miles away in spirit as they listened to Arturo Onevás, administrator of Marambío base talk about the problems he was having. Shaw had drifted off, but as he focused once more, Arturo’s strident pleadings became clearer.

“We cannot hold out much longer, Colonel Burke. We’re down to a few days rations, at most. No medical supplies… I have no choice but to request, once again, refugee status at your base.”

“And I have no choice but to tell you, Mr. Onevás, yet again, that I cannot grant you that status without first clearing it with my government. McMurdo Station is sovereign US territory.”

Jennifer put her head down on her folded arms, clearly tired of listening to the conversation. Shaw could hardly blame her.

“Perhaps you can ask one of the other bases…” continued Burke.

“You don’t think we have already done this?” Arturo’s voice rose. “We’ve asked
everyone
. No one can spare the space, or the food, or the people to move us.”

There was no dissent from the other silent listeners on the conference call, telling Shaw as clearly as if they had said it outright that Arturo was telling the truth. Without comment, without a vote, without any sort of discussion amongst the other nations, it was easy to see what had been decided.

The Argentinians were being left to die.

In retrospect, he should have seen it coming. All anyone had to do to know what was going to happen was to look at what had
already
happened. The United Nations had existed for nearly seventy years, and although it had accomplished some good, by the time the world died it had been no closer to its goal of unification than when it had started. The new “Antarctic Nations,” as they called themselves, were no better. Infighting, refusal to share resources, constant and useless talking among the diplomats… none of it did any good. They were all dying, slowly and surely. Due to their resources, the Americans might take a little longer, but no one was getting out of this.

It shouldn’t have been a surprise when Jennifer spoke up, either. He should’ve been ready for that passion, that fire that he loved so much, to ignite her anger. But he was tired, and he didn’t spot it until it was too late.

It started as a mumble, heard through the layers of her coat and reflected off the table, so no one understood it.

“What was that, marshal?” asked Burke, turning toward her from his post at the end of the table.

Shaw realized what was about to happen and laid a hand on her arm, but she stood up, never noticing his implied restraint. And then it was far, far too late for him to stop her.

“You’re all a bunch of fucking idiots!” she yelled, stunning everyone in the room—and no doubt those sitting on the phone—into silence with her vehemence. “There’s what, maybe a thousand, twelve hundred, of us left down here in Hell? Across the most God-forsaken landscape this world has ever come up with, a goddamn desert of ice, there are twelve hundred of us. Twelve hundred real humans left.”

Jennifer moved closer to the speakerphone in the middle of the table, no one thinking to restrain her.

Burke had had just about enough. “Marshal, please sit down,” he said, rising from his seat, his voice strained from his attempt at civility. “Now.”

Jennifer completely ignored him. “Three years ago, there were seven billion people on this planet. Think about that for a second. Seven
billion
. And now we’re down to just over
one
thousand
. But we’re not just down to a thousand, are we? Because those other six billion and change didn’t all die, did they? They’re still out there, roaming and eating and killing.”

“Just a moment, marshal,” said Nigel Mackey, the UK delegate. “What about those bunkers you Americans were building? That’s another hundred thousand people right there.”

“Sure, fine. That’s another hundred thousand. But do they really matter? Sealed up tight inside their bunkers, waiting for the world to calm down? And all of them tens of thousands of miles away, with no way to help us. They might as well be on the moon. Hell,
we
might as well be on the moon.”

“Marshal, sit down!” Burke began to move toward Jennifer, but Shaw stood and caught his eye, shaking his head slowly. Something about the look in Shaw’s eyes must’ve told him it would’ve been a losing battle, and Burke blinked twice, shocked, and stayed where he was, sitting back down. As Shaw returned to his own seat, he knew he was going to hear about this later, and might even lose his commission, but right now he didn’t even care.

Because Jennifer was right.

“We are the last surviving humans on the face of the earth,” Jennifer continued. “We’re
it
, folks. Monroe, how long has it been since we got any transmissions from outside?”

Jackson Monroe, the base’s head of communications, took off his glasses and threw them on the table. He massaged the bridge of his nose, thinking before he spoke. When he answered, his voice was strong and confident. “Three months.”

“And what was the source?”

Jackson sighed. “An automated SOS signal from who knows where. We tried to trace it, but we think it bounced off some unusual activity in the atmosphere, and could’ve come from anywhere. Since it was Morse Code, there’s no way of knowing the origin.”

“And before that?”

“We got a satellite relay from the folks at Christchurch about six months ago. They were… well,
unhinged
would be a good way to put it.”

Jennifer nodded. “Thanks, Jackson. What about the rest of you? Anyone else have any transmissions more recently? Or more important?”

The silence from the speaker was deafening.

“That’s what I thought.
We are alone down here
. And all this nationalistic crap about who should send supplies to whom, or who should seek refugee status, it’s all moot.
There are no more countries for us to be loyal to
. They’re gone. And they’re damn sure not coming back anytime soon, maybe not ever if we don’t survive this.”

She took a deep breath and sat down as one of the other department heads stood up and offered her the seat closer to the phone. Taking the seat next to Shaw that she had vacated, the man put a comforting hand on Shaw’s shoulder. “She’s right, you know,” he whispered.

Shaw nodded. “And she’s not done yet.”

“Did you know about any of this?”

“Not even a little. Shhh…”

“I’m done pussy-footing around here, trying to be friends with everyone,” said Jennifer. “This ‘Antarctic Nations’ thing is a good idea in spirit, but the implementation is crap. There’s only a thousand of us left, and half of those don’t even get to participate in these discussions, even through representation by their department heads.”

The Chinese delegate, Jiayi Sun, spoke up. “You’ve made your feelings clear on numerous occasions, Ms. Michaelson. However, you cannot tell us how to run our operations. As you said, our bases are sovereign lands.”

“You’re right, Mr. Sun. We can’t. That’s why it’s time to forget our separate bases altogether.” There was a collective in-drawn breath from everyone at the table and, to Shaw’s ear, from the speakerphone as well.

Has she gone too far this time?
he wondered.
Doesn’t matter. It’s not like I could stop her now
.

“Ms. Michaelson, that is quite enough,” said Burke. “I suggest that all the delegates adjourn—”

“I’m not finished,” said Jennifer quietly, but in a tone that brooked no more interference.

He couldn’t see the look she directed Burke’s way, but Shaw was amazed when the man fumbled to a stop and just stared at her. Like he’d seen a perfectly timid little rabbit turn into a tiger right in front of him. Shaw grinned from ear to ear, happy to see that she’d finally let her iron-clad self-control slip a bit.

“Here’s what we’re going to do,” she said, directing her remarks once more towards the delegates listening on the call. “McMurdo Station officially recognizes the refugee request from Marambío Base, and will gladly take in their personnel. At the end of this call, I will personally arrange for immediate transportation from Marambío to McMurdo for personnel and limited effects only. We will have to work out some other way of getting your equipment and everything else usable from the base at a later time.”

As she paused, everyone in the room could hear excited yelling, obviously from the Argentinians. Onevás returned to the line. “Thank you, Ms. Michaelson. You’ve saved us. Whatever we can do, we will.”

Jennifer nodded, as though he could see her. “You’re welcome, Mr. Onevás. As for the rest of you, here’s the new plan: we’re going to consolidate everyone here, at McMurdo.”

Shaw thought Burke’s eyes were about to pop out of his head when Jennifer granted Marambío’s request, but at this last idea, he stood up, red-faced and shouting. “You can’t do that! We don’t have enough room! We don’t have the security forces, or the supplies! What about our people here? Dammit, you can’t do that!” He began moving around the table towards Jennifer but stopped short at the sound of a round being chambered in the pistol Shaw was suddenly pointing at his head. “Major? What the hell are you doing? I’ll have your ass for this!”

“No, sir, you won’t,” said Shaw, never glancing away from the colonel. He could see Jennifer looking at him out of the corner of his eye, and he smiled. “You see, she’s right. If any of us are going to survive, we’re going to have to work together. And the only thing standing in the way of that right now is you, and a few of the other folks on the line, there.”

A new voice came onto the speaker, a woman speaking rapidly in Mandarin Chinese, then switching to broken English. “Hello, hello! This is Li Guo, Chief Scientist at Zhongshan Station. Speaking for people here, we accept. Yes, we will join.”

Without taking her eyes off Burke and Shaw, Jennifer replied. “Ms. Guo, I’m glad to hear it. May I inquire about Mr. Sun?”

“Mr. Sun is… busy, at the moment. He can’t come to the phone right now.”

Jennifer looked like she was almost smiling as she nodded. “I see. Well, that’s Argentina and China on board. We can work out the details later, but I propose that we combine the resources of all the Antarctic stations: people, supplies, equipment, everything. We can do it here, as the largest of the stations. We’ll build more buildings if we need to. Don’t think it’ll be easy, cause it won’t. This will take time.” She looked around the room, seeing nothing but support in the faces of those gathered there, except, of course, Colonel Burke.

Shaw put away his pistol as two of the more burly scientists in the room took Burke out. “We’ll take him to holding, sir,” they said as they passed Shaw. He nodded and took his seat, turning back to Jennifer.

She gave him a quick smile and then addressed the conference call once more. “It’s not just about survival. We need a
reason
to survive, a goal to strive for. We haven’t had that in three years, but now we do. Saving what’s left of the human race is as admirable a goal as I’ve ever heard of, and we can do it, but we have to start
now
.” She paused, looking around once more. “If anyone has anything to say against this plan, now’s the time. That’s for you folks on the call, by the way. All of us here are ready to make this happen.”