The Extinction Switch: Book three of the Kato's War series (15 page)

“No?”

“His hope was that someone would make a mistake with handling the antimatter someday, and would destroy Entara by accident.”

Zu looked stunned. His lips moved slightly, but no words came out. “My God…” he managed, eventually.

“He knew the Master was evil,” Tang said, “and would likely be revived eventually. He foresaw the Master’s desire for relentless expansion into the universe. He wanted, even at the cost of every life on Entara, to make sure that didn’t happen.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Induction

One kilometer before the eight-lane road entered Lyon, it went underground. Akio and Zara were soon walking under the yellow glare of sodium lamps. By this time, they had some company: disheveled people walked in both directions. There was no traffic. They soon came upon a knot of people, forming a rough line. Their tones were tense and urgent. There was a tank and two armored personnel carriers in the background. An army checkpoint. The troops could be heard, asking, “Name? Home town? Purpose of travel? Are you carrying any weapons?” Akio and Zara looked at each other, and joined the line. Once they had reached the front, they were asked the same questions. “Zara and Akio Nishimura,” Zara said. “We have residences in London, Hong Kong and New York. Please, we’re just trying to find our daughter.”

“Which army are you?” Akio interjected.

“Government forces,” the soldier said, irritably.

“Who’s in control of the city?” Zara asked.

“I can’t comment.” The trooper watched their faces intently for a few seconds. “Okay, step to the right for a scan.” Once they had done so, another officer passed a wand from left to right a meter in front of them. Transparent images of them and their belongings appeared on a midair display to his left. “Go ahead,” he said. “Be warned there is a 6PM curfew.”

“Thank you.” Zara and Akio grabbed their small bags, and continued down the long, dismal tunnel. After a while, Zara stopped, took out her display unit, and opened a midair map of the city. Their location was shown as a dot a little way in from the western edge.

Akio looked at the map. “The highways like this one seem to be sandwiched between the upper and lower levels of the city,” he said. “So, three inhabited levels plus this one. The place is huge. Where do we go?”

Zara looked at him. “I have absolutely no idea. A needle in a haystack is an understatement. That’s if she’s even still here. But, we have to start somewhere.” Akio put his arms around her. They hugged each other, as groups of refugees walked around them.

----

David, Vivianne, Annabelle, Kassandra, and Antonio sat in a row, on metal chairs, under the harsh floodlight that shone down on the center ring on level thirty. To their left stood Lord August, an angry-looking JC. Onlookers sat on the floor around the group and along catwalk E, almost as far back as the deck at the outer silo wall. Other spectators stood on the bridges on levels above, looking down. Lord August had to raise his voice to be heard: “Members of The Excluded, I present to you our newest residents.” He gestured to them with a sweep of his right hand. “Today, they will be sworn in, and will receive the Mark.” Cheers from all around echoed from the gray concrete walls. After a suitable pause, Lord August turned to the inductees. “Do you swear to protect The Excluded with your every breath and sinew, forsaking yourself when necessary in the interests of the community?”

“We do,” they said in unison. Magana beamed from her spot near the front of the crowd.

Lord August continued, “And do you swear to keep our existence secret, even unto death?”

“We do.”

“As well as standing for Excluded, the four points of the X stand for our core values: loyalty, bravery, duty, and submission to a higher authority,” Lord August said. “By receiving this brand, you swear to uphold them as long as you shall live. And by the commingling of blood, you are bound together forever.” The onlookers all stood, and crossed their forearms in front of their faces, to represent an X. Lord August produced a knife, with a round wooden handle. Embedded into the end of this were three Stanley knife blades glued together. He walked over to David, at the end of the row. David held out his right arm, fist closed, and palm down. His teeth were gritted. Lord August took his wrist, and quickly carved two crisscrossing gashes into the flesh. They extended from his elbow to his wrist. David’s face was contorted with pain. Blood poured from the wounds. A young lady in front of him sprang forward and put a towel around his arm, and a plastic container on the ground between his legs to catch any drips. Vivianne held out her arm. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. Fresh blood soon poured from her arm also. Another nurse was there immediately, tending to her. The knife was not cleaned between uses. Annabelle, Kassandra, and Antonio received their marks. They all managed to stop themselves from crying out, as cloths were pressed against their wounds. The crowd broke into applause. Despite Lord August’s admonitions to let them have the space to get their wounds dressed, people surged forward.

“Welcome.” “We’re glad you’re here,” they said, clapping an arm around the inductees’ shoulders. There were men, women, and children of all ages.

“Thanks,” David managed. Their eyes became moist at the overwhelming experience.

----

“I bet you never saw this coming when we met on the bus that night,” Annabelle said to David. “Being bound in a blood oath in an underground silo!” It was two days after the ceremony. They were leaning over the railing on level twenty-four. She held her right forearm, still bandaged, next to his left arm.

David snorted. “No, I sure as heck didn’t!” After a moment, he continued, “When we got here I thought this place was basically comprised of different groups of hobos, but it’s not. It’s organized and purposeful.”

“I don’t really
want
to be excluded from society,” Annabelle said. “But, any port in a storm.” David nodded. “What do you want to do here, as far as duties go?” Annabelle said.

“They said they’d assign us duties when we first got here, but it hasn’t happened yet for some reason,” David said.

“Do you think they’re testing us?”

David shrugged. “Could well be. They’re probably waiting to see where our interests lie. I’m most interested in the Electrician role.” He stood up straight and became more animated. “It’s cool how they power this place. There are induction coils around the conduits that supply electricity to the lights on each platform. They siphon off power. But here’s the clever part: the current’s too low to directly power anything that takes a lot of watts. So, they use it to trickle charge big batteries. They then use those to run things like stoves and hoists.”

Annabelle raised her eyebrows. “Huh.”

“They’re a resourceful lot, I’ll give them that,” he said, with a smile.

“Yes they are.”

“Kassie seems to have made her mind up what she’s doing,” David said. “She’s going after the Defender thing in a big way. Viv’s probably going to end up teaching preschool, not least so she can be with Etienne.” Annabelle nodded. “Antonio’s trying his best not to do anything, it seems.”

Annabelle scowled and began to turn red. “That guy irritates me so much. He expects everything to be done for him, and that he’ll never have to get his hands dirty. I’m sorry, but that’s not how this place works. Nor life in general.”

“Right. But, life has a way of teaching people the lessons they need to learn.”

----

“I’m already hot,” Antonio complained, “and I’ve only had this thing on for five minutes.” He was dressed from head to toe in a white hazmat suit, with a face visor and respirator.

“You’ll get used to it,” the man standing in front of him said. He had a wide face and receding hair, still thick on top, brushed back. His forehead bore deep lines. “I’m Seth, by the way.” He was already halfway into his suit. “We’ll be on our way down soon.” Antonio turned around and looked, with a disgusted expression, at his means of transport. It was a gray tub, like a Dumpster with no lid, made of thick plastic, roughly three meters by two. It was suspended, from above, half a meter out from the railing of the walkway he now stood on. The inside was caked with a thick layer of black dirt. “Go ahead and jump in,” Seth said.

A loud sigh was heard from Antonio’s respirator. “Uh… okay…”

“Use the ropes for balance.” The main line suspending the tub was a one centimeter-wide strand of steel, which split off into four other lines, one for each corner. Antonio climbed up the first two bars of the railings. “Oh God,” he said, looking down into the darkness.

“It’s okay,” Seth reassured him. “Stop looking down. Grab the rope to your left. The tub’ll spin a little bit, but it can’t go too far. Then just jump in.” Antonio blew air out slowly through puckered lips. Then he did as Seth instructed. The skip bucked and spun a little from Antonio’s weight. The end bumped into the railing, which arrested the movement. “There you go!” Seth said. “I’ll finish suiting up on the way down.” Seth hopped nimbly in beside Antonio. A control unit with several buttons dangled over the center of the tub. Seth pushed one of them. They set off downwards, with a jolt.

Antonio watched the levels go by: fourteen, thirteen, twelve. He cautiously looked down. This caused the tub to tip slightly. “Whoa!” he said, jumping back from the edge. Seth laughed. Antonio shot him a furious look.

Seth pulled on the hood of his hazmat suit and fiddled with the respirator. Level eight, seven, six… “Hey Mary!” Seth shouted, though it was muted by his respirator, and waved to a woman walking on along the level six catwalk.

“Hey Seth!” She waved back.

The bridge at level five was blackened and twisted, but still passable. Level four was broken, and barely holding itself up. There were no bridges below that; only stubs where the ends once were. “Oh, the explosion…” Antonio said.

“Yeah,” Seth said. The floor, an undulating sea of rotting garbage, came up to meet them. The tub came to rest with a slight bump.

“Right. Grab a shovel, and get digging!” Seth said. He hopped out, and scrap of all kinds crunched beneath his feet. Seth sank a few centimeters.

“Ugh…” Antonio said, surveying the scene with a look of outright disgust. “Please tell me there isn’t toilet waste down here.”

“There is some of that too,” Seth said, “though it’s mainly cans, food packaging, and rags.” He grabbed one of the generously-sized shovels, which was clasped to the outside of the tub, while motioning to Antonio to take the other one.

Antonio looked down at the filth beneath his feet, and took the implement. “I suppose I should be thankful I can’t smell it,” he said, driving the blade halfway into the mess. He followed Seth’s lead, and dumped the shovelful into the tub they had just ridden down. A few shovelfuls later, Antonio stopped and looked at Seth. “How are we going to get back up? Please tell me we don’t…”

“Ride on top of the garbage? Yes, sir. That’s what we do.” Seth grinned.

“Oh, dear Lord.”

“Get used to it, boy.”

“I just wish I could wipe my forehead or something.”

“You could, but the health consequences of exposing your face wouldn’t be worth it. Trust me. But, the perk of this work is we get the best bathing privileges of anybody in the silo.”

“I suppose that’s something,” Antonio said, as he resumed shoveling. The men worked in silence for a few minutes.

“This is no kind of work for an old guy like me,” Seth grumbled, good-humoredly. “I could be sitting admiring the countryside, glass of wine in hand. You can produce a few bottles a year on your little share plot, you know.” Antonio grunted. “But, this looks like the best place to be for the foreseeable future,” Seth continued.

“What made you come down here in the first place?” Antonio asked.

Seth stopped digging. “My wife died around four years ago. I wanted some adventure, I guess. A different life. There was a rumor on the nets about this place, but few specifics on where it was. So, I came to Lyon and started looking. It was devilishly hard to find. I had to make many, many inquiries in the underworld, and get prior approval via a chain of people before they’d let me in.”

“Hmm. Who’s the actual leader?”

Seth resumed digging, as he replied. “Lord August. He founded the place, around forty years ago.”

“Ah.” The men shoveled in silence. Antonio took frequent breaks, while Seth worked like a machine.

At last, Seth stood up straight. He dropped the shovel, and pressed his lower spine while he arched his back. “Ah, that’s better. Okay, let’s keep going.”

“Can we take a break?”

“On the ride up, yes.”

“So not until we’ve filled this entire thing?”

“Correct.”

“So… if the ride up is a break, does that mean there’s more work when we get there?”

“I’m afraid so, boy. We get to move all the garbage to wheeled Dumpsters.”

“Oh, crap.” Antonio resumed working. A little while later, he said: “So where does it all get put once it’s in the Dumpsters?”

“Ah, that’s the interesting part,” Seth said. “There are two wide, round tunnels leading out from level fifteen. They go in opposite directions straight to service shafts, a couple of kilometers away. The garbage goes into those. We still need to get through the tunnels occasionally though, so we have guys welding cages to the sides. The trash gets stuffed in the cages, while leaving a path through the middle for access.”