The Freezer (Genesis Endeavor Book 1) (17 page)

“War? Oh no, nothing like that. There have been some
situations that turned violent, but it’s more like we have restricted trade,
and we are always extra careful when dealing with them. We used to trade men
with them, sometimes for resources, sometimes for men to come here and
fertilize our women. The agreement was always to send a man to mate with a
prearranged number of women. However, they started forcing our men to be with
more women than was agreed upon, so in more recent years, we have traded
fertilized eggs that they can plant in their women or grow in their artificial
wombs.

“Like I said, Cali is not exactly in line with our
philosophies on expanding the human race, particularly where it comes to
government.”

Jack was intrigued. “What’s their problem? I would think
after all humanity has been through, everyone would be working toward the
common goal of saving it.”

“The problem goes all the way back to the first big war. When
the war started, the majority of California residents did not want to
participate. The U.S. was already in Iraq, Israel, Afghanistan, and Iran, and
California was the most outspoken about pulling the U.S. troops out and letting
those countries’ governments handle their own problems. China had been taking
over countries to the north and south of them, and the U.S. had not responded
with force, so they figured they could take Taiwan and nobody would bother to
stop them. The problem was, the United States had a treaty with Taiwan, and
were bound by it to protect them. If they let China take over, it would tell
the rest of the world that a treaty with the U.S. was worthless. The U.S.’s
hand had been forced, and troops were sent. With the other wars going on, the
military was stretched to its limit, so the government had to bring back the
draft. That was the straw that broke the camel’s back, and California seceded
from the Union. Many members of the military were from California, and all of a
sudden they had to choose between their country and their state. It got ugly.

“The war escalated over the next few years until there were
three main alliances. China controlled much of Asia, the Islamic State had the Middle
East and much of Eastern Europe, and the U.S. and Western Europe more or less
controlled the rest. There had been a few isolated nuclear attacks, but it wasn’t
until China had opened up another war front on the Middle East that nuclear
weapons threats became a reality. China was afraid they didn’t have the
resources to fight two wars, so they decided to make a last ditch effort and a
full scale nuclear attack was the result. Once the nukes started flying and it
was obvious the war was going to get worse before it got better, both China and
the U.S. decided to eliminate any potential threat from California. You see, after
the secession, the President of the United States had ordered federal military
forces to be evacuated out of California. The now sovereign nation of
California had no protection, and was left scrambling for militia. They managed
to put together a sizable ground force, and even managed to keep a lot of the
assets from the military bases on their soil. They did not, however, have codes
to launch the nukes that they had kept, and certainly had no viable missile
defense system. They were an easy target and they were hit hard, worse than any
other place in the world. Today the land is mostly radioactive wasteland. Not
only that, the pounding they took was so intense that the fault lines that
criss-cross the state were... aggravated. Earthquakes tore up what the nukes
didn’t. Despite it all, there were still some small areas that were left
inhabitable, and the survivors there were not happy. The world had turned their
back on California, and you could say that even after over two hundred and
fifty years, they still hold a grudge.”

Jack took it all in, not entirely surprised. He was from
California, and he could definitely see where they could self-destruct like
that. “So there is limited trade. How do you balance that with them being
hostile? Is there something else going on that I don’t know about?” The elevator
had reached the fourth floor and they had exited and walked down a hall. There
were heavy doors on either side of the hallway for about a hundred feet, and at
the end of the hall was a set of double doors. As they talked, they approached
the doors.

Teague nodded as he went on. “They are very aggressive, and
figure that none of the other communities, with the exception of the Yanks,
pose any real threat to them. They don’t bother to live below ground, and even
the Mutes don’t trouble them. The area they control is a maze of radioactive
zones, and, unlike the day the bombs dropped, their air defense systems are as
good as can be. They have regular patrols looking for people to add to their
population, and they don’t usually ask whether the people they find would like
to be a part of their community. We lost a patrol about five years ago, and it
was pretty clear that Cali was responsible, even though they denied it. If it
weren’t for the resources they have, New Hope and many other small communities
like us would have long ago stopped trading with them. Unfortunately, we need
what they have, and they know it.” They reached the doors and Teague put his
eye up to a lens next to the door. There was a beep and a click and they
proceeded through the door.

“You said there were two large communities. Are the Yanks
the other one?” Jack was starting to get a mental picture of how things really
stood, and while New Hope was in an excellent position because of the discovery
in Montana, the question was quickly becoming whether or not they could hold
that advantage.

“Yes, the other group is the Yanks. They are the largest
single community in the world that we are aware of. We estimate their numbers
at over two thousand, but we have no idea how many of those are fertile and how
many are clones of the originals. We do know they live above ground on the east
coast and that there is a facility similar to this one below their city. It is
only inhabited by their core government, which numbers in the dozens. They are
located between two major radioactive sites: New York, and D.C.”

“Two thousand? How did they get so big?” Jack was astonished
at this. Until now it sounded like there wasn’t a community bigger than a few
hundred.

“They merged three large communities together, pretty much
by force, and in the last forty years have increased in size by ten times. Their
size is only limited by their resources right now, and they have their eyes on
expanding to other communities. They are similar to Cali only much larger and
much more aggressive. The only upside for us right now is the distance from us
to them.”

They entered a room that was set up like a classroom. Banks
of tables were lined up, all facing what looked like a huge sheet of white
glass. There was a short table in front of the glass that had some controls on
it.

Jack mulled over the information, and then asked the
question that he felt was most relevant. “So what keeps you and the other
communities from joining the Calis or the Yanks? It seems that the best chance
for humanity to survive would be to combine groups and work toward a common
goal.”

Teague gathered his thoughts before answering. “It comes
down to a matter of philosophy. The Calis are driven by greed. They don’t care
who they hurt to get their way. They learned from the mistakes of the EoS, but
they never learned the value of individual life. The Yanks, on the other hand,
are driven by a government that is not much different than that of the EoS. The
only real difference is they don’t turn people away when they can no longer
contribute to the community, they simply clone them. Their cloning facilities
are rumored to have a capacity of over fifty people at a time.”

“Wait; in order to clone them, they have to kill them first,
right?” The thought sent a shiver up Jack’s spine.

Teague nodded grimly. “The last we heard, the governing body
is able to do this by convincing their people that they are ‘reincarnated’ in
the cloning process, and the death of their old body just paves the way for
them to enter their new body.” Before Jack could react to this, Teague quickly shifted
gears, “You see, the leaders of the EoS didn’t have any fundamental respect for
life, but it went beyond that. If you lived in an EoS city, you were evaluated
for your strengths and weaknesses and given a job that suited your abilities. Despite
being safe and living in relative comfort, nobody was truly free. In many
cases, some people found themselves working harder than others, and
dissatisfaction turned to contempt. The population was looking for change,
regardless of the nature of the change. They didn’t necessarily know what they
wanted, but they knew they were unhappy. When the new religions formed, the
general population flocked to them. The struggles for power that ensued were
fueled by the follower’s anger. Cali and the Yanks may have learned that war is
not the answer to any dispute, but we don’t see any signs that either have
really learned that keeping their citizens’ freedom and happiness are the key
to preventing the situations that lead to war.

“New Hope is founded on the principle that not only is all
human life valuable, but freedom of choice and freedom from oppression are just
as important to the health of a community as survival. Why survive if only to
live at the whim of your government?”

Jack felt he now had a full understanding of the situation. He
was a firm believer in the Constitution of the United States, and had put his
life on the line to prevent the spread of ideas like Communism, which he
believed were a threat to personal freedom. He was aware that a capitalistic
driven democracy was not perfect, but in his mind it was far better than having
a government that looked at its people as a whole at the expense of the
individual, or worse, looked at its people as a tool to increase their power
and wealth. “Teague, my own personal beliefs are in alignment with New Hope,
but I have to ask, how are the people here represented? Are your leaders
elected?” He believed that in order to have a government that is truly a
democracy, the majority population has to have the right to choose who will
lead them.

“New Hope is run by a council; all of us in the council are
clones of the original founders of New Hope. There was no need to elect anyone
as there were only a handful of us. Marcus was a natural leader, so if there
was ever conflict when a decision had to be made, he was the one who had the
final say. As we grew, most decisions were made as a community, but only in the
past few dozen years have we grown large enough to even consider a specific
leader.”

Teague looked at Jack and grinned. “You are, quite frankly,
the first one to ask this question. The few people we have found over the years
never questioned our leadership, and neither did their children. The fifty
people we have brought back in four years have all taken for granted that
Marcus was our leader, and so far they have followed without question. Sometimes
things have not worked out and people left New Hope. This was usually because
of a relationship gone bad, but there have been cases of people leaving because
they believed we were not aggressive enough, or because we didn’t take from
others what we were capable of taking. Those of us who are still here all agree
that only destruction lies down that path. Within the next few years, perhaps
even sooner, we may very well find ourselves in a position to hold an election,
but for the time being the council sets the rules.”

Jack was a bit disappointed in the answer, but it made
sense. When there were very few people, you put them where they could help the
most. In this case, the ones with almost two hundred years of experience were
probably best suited to lead. At least they were open to the idea of a
democracy. Teague gestured to one of the chairs at a table in the front row. Jack
took in the room before sitting down. It was a fairly large room set up like an
auditorium or large classroom, perhaps fifty feet wide and just as deep. The
multiple rows of tiered seating curved slightly so everyone who was seated
could focus on the front of the room where a large flat glass wall about ten
feet high and twenty feet wide stood. The front row had a table curved along
the length of the seating, and in the center was what looked like a control
station of some sort. Teague walked over to the controls and started pushing
buttons.

“What about other communities? How many are there and where
do they stand on Cali and the Yanks?” Jack recognized that New Hope was very
small in relationship to the other communities and that made them vulnerable. He
was thinking that perhaps there were other communities they could ally with to
prevent the big dogs from walking all over them.

“There are six other communities that we trade with, all in
North America. We know of one more in the far north, and one down in Central
America, and we have confirmed at least a dozen more throughout South America,
Africa, Asia, and Europe. They are too far away to be either a threat or a
benefit however, so we have mutually avoided them. Occasionally we pass
information back and forth, but contact is usually only a couple times per year
with each.

“The six that we do work with are mostly similar to us.” He
pressed some buttons and the lights in the room dimmed before the big sheet of
glass lit up with a map of North America. “There is New Phoenix, Swamp City,
Wisner Camp, Sunnyside, Deering, and NewBury.” As he named them, dots popped on
to the screens with a flash, signifying their location. New Phoenix was
actually in Texas, to Jack’s surprise. “Populations range from fifty to two
hundred. They all more or less share our philosophy. Most of those who choose
to leave end up at one of these locations. We have been discussing an alliance
for about twenty years now, and quite frankly we were on the verge of agreement
back when we found the Montana site. Since then we have stalled, knowing that
if we form the alliance, they will either figure out for themselves or we will
have to tell them about the cryogenics facility. Just like with Cali or the
Yanks, we worry that just the knowledge of this could cause trouble for us. Soon
we will have to make a decision.”