Apocalypse's Prelude

by Carl Damen

  He picked up a form he had gotten from the other nurse, scribbled his name on it, and thrust it at her. "Here, clean bill of health. Now, you tell Jack that we're done. He's gotten my daughter into this, but he's not going to get me." And with that he surged through the curtain and disappeared into the labyrinth of dividers.

  Alice closed her eyes and gritted her teeth, tried to hold in a scream. Couldn't he see that this was just, that the Defenders were merely protecting themselves, making themselves safe so they could protect the world? All they needed was his key-card, or him to escort them, or something to get them past Mistaren's security. Now what were they going to do?

  She continued to think over the problem as she made her way back to the first room, passed off Grant's signature to the nurse, and left the building to stand in the cold November wind, shivering more from the smell that was beginning to permeate the compound than from the cold.

  She was just dialing the number Cyd had given her when the solution to their problem came to her: the Central Maintenance Core. They already had to go down to the basement to attach the scramblers to the building's super-structure. It wasn't any more of a stretch to take the utility elevator up to the General's backdoor.

  There was a click, an overly cheery "Wassup?"

  "I wanted you to know that I made it into the camp. Just as soon they let us out I'll be down in New Jersey to see you."

  "Were you able to meet with the nurse?" Cyd's voice was business neutral. It was still difficult for Alice to correlate the hardened soldier to the incessantly perky bag lady.

  "I spoke to the nurse about my current medical issue. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to get me in to see the doctor. But as I was leaving, I thought of an alternative treatment..."

  5

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 29

  Thick-treaded tires crunched over the debris that littered the street. The heavily armored troop transport moved slowly, rumbling as it made its implacable way over parked cars and chunks of fallen masonry. Inside the transport, shielded by hydraulic suspension, the eight E.H.U.D.-clad Defenders felt nothing. Jack, sitting at the head of the passenger compartment, wearing nothing more advanced than canvas pants and a tee-shirt, felt some of the truck's bobbing, but his mind was focused far enough away that his body's nausea didn't bother him.

  The truck slowed, groaned to a halt, vibrated as it idled. Voices could be heard from the cab, laughter, a gloved hand patting the ceramic plates covering the hood. The engine roared, the vibration increased in intensity, and the truck pulled forward.

  They were going slower now than they had out in the city proper, and Jack felt a mixture of relief and nervous tension. As much as he wanted to get this over with, to put all the planning and careful execution behind him, he wanted to wait just a little while longer, to stay in this moment where everything looked good on paper, where there was no reality to smash his plans.

  Around him, leaking from the others despite orders to keep a tight hold on emotion, were similar feelings. Most of them had remembered months ago, had lived with secret knowledge of what was really moving world events, had wanted to do something—anything—to make their presence known. Only now did they appreciate the security they had felt, the knowledge that they were unknown, could slip away whenever they wanted, could become whoever they wanted. Now they were committed, now they were actually putting Allen's ideas into practice. Yesterday they were ghosts, haunting humanity's dreams, but not really affecting them. Tomorrow they would be gods, stepping up with the nations of the world to impose an endless peace. Today, they were afraid, and were doing a poor job of holding it in.

  "Quiet yourselves," Jack whispered. "We can't let him suspect anything until the last possible moment."

  Eight skull-like masks dipped in shallow nods; eight skull-like masks remained staring down at sixteen booted feet.

  The truck slowed again, the engined rumbled, died, and the back doors were pulled open. Jack pulled on a cap and glasses, trying to hide as much of his glistening pink face as possible. It seemed unlikely that anyone would recognize his old face amidst the scarring, but he didn't want to take any chances.

  Two more E.H.U.D.s from the cab of the truck joined them and the ten Defenders escorted the man around the side of the tower and down a sloping tunnel that led into the super-structure.

  At the bottom of the tunnel was a huge cargo doorway, sealed by a roll-up door. A few soldiers stood around, helmets off, relaxed in the pocket of warmth the tower afforded them.

  They straightened when the noticed the squad of newcomers, and one stepped forward.

  "Hey. You guys with the medical delivery?"

  "Yeah, we got the truck back up top," Naomi answered, her voice sounding tinny through the speakers.

  "Well, why don't you go back up there and get it then?" the soldier asked, sounding more irritated than suspicious.

  The fact that the E.H.U.D. armor was unique to the United States and that this was a primarily civilian compound kept him off-guard enough for Naomi to approach, lay a hand on his shoulder, and headbutt him, his nose flattening and jetting blood into his collar.

  The other Defenders sprang into action, each picking a target and quickly incapacitating them. Five seconds, and all the guards were unconscious.

  One of the Defenders—Jack thought it was Vince—approached him, holding a plastic key-card. "Found this on the corporal over there." The voice was definitely Vince. "It'll unlock the door, but I don't know how suspicious it'll be to open from out here. In theory, there should be someone from the medical staff coming out to check on the supplies."

  Jack shook his head. "The fact they have active guards on this door seems to me like they haven't upgraded the security system down here. Unlocking it from this side shouldn't raise any flags."

  Vince nodded, then bounced away in the direction of the massive door. A moment later there was a grinding, and the door began to raise, folding away into the ceiling.

  "Right then." Jack stepped forward, once more into Sky Crest.

  He had never been on this level of the building before, but he knew it well enough from the blueprints. A vast storage area, all concrete, with great pillars rising like a forest of dead trees into the ceiling twenty-five feet overhead. Huge halogen lamps, kept locked behind wire cages, lit the space. An unconscious shudder passed through the Defenders; this place reminded them too much of their imprisonment.

  Jack took another step forward, but Naomi stepped in front of him, taking point as they passed by pallets stacked high with bright-blue boxes marked "NOT FOR RESALE—FEMA." Here and there were thicker, flat-sided pillars: freight elevators.

  A minute of walking and they reached another roll-away door, set into a straight section of wall imposed on curved barrier that stretched away to either side, disappearing into the glow of the bright lights overhead. This was it: the Central Maintenance Core.

  This door opened with the simple push of a button, then they were in. The CMC looked much as it did in the digital models: A concrete tube a hundred and fifty feet in diameter, extending up for fifty feet before swiftly constricting to just over twenty feet wide and continuing upwards forever. A ring of exposed metal girders stretched down from where the ceiling constricted, enclosing the flat platform of the utility elevator.

  "Right. You all know what to do."

  Nine of the defenders broke off, each pulling several thin scramblers from various pockets and pouches scattered across their bodies. Then they were off around the ring of girders, strapping the scramblers on with copious amounts of duct tape.

  Naomi stood close to Jack, piecing together a large assault rifle. Jack watched her for a moment before his nerves got the best of him and he felt he had to talk. "It's a good thing Alice told you about that place."

  Naomi grunted. "It's a good thing they cleared out of there so fast they forgot to pick up their supplies."

  Jack nodded slowly. "I don't think this is going to work."

  Ther
e was a click as the magazine was snapped in and a round was chambered. "Too late for second thoughts. If cycling the scramblers doesn't stop him, nothing will. Then we might as well give up and die."

  Jack glanced down at his chest, at the spindly limbs that stretched from it. "I'm going to die tonight either way."

  "Just your body."

  "I never had kids. Seems a waste of genes..."

  "Genes you had at birth are gone now anyway..."

  He hadn't thought of that. He shrugged, then stepped up onto the elevator. "Right, everybody, one more time, just for safety. We get to the fiftieth floor, you switch them on. Cycle frequencies every ten seconds. Five minutes in, you snap scramblers off for a cycle, then back on. After that, it's out of our hands."

  Solemn nods all around. Naomi followed him onto the platform.

  Speaking of revenge, telling Allen how much he wanted to strike back, being told by Allen he would lead, all of that had seemed so good at the time. Now, actually being in charge, actually having lives in his hands—Jack didn't like it. Sending Amanda to the president, that had been a risk with a high degree of return, a risk she was certain to survive. Asking Grant to participate in the technical assassination of an appointed public official, that was risky, that had a much lower rate of success. The refusal to help had shaken Jack, though he wouldn't let the other Defenders see that. If even his brother didn't trust him, how could they?

  He stopped walking—stopped thinking—when he reached the center of the platform. He could now look up and see all the way up to the metal umbrella shielding this chimney, see rows of colored lights stretching up the sides of the core, showing a warren of tunnels leading off into the building.

  As he stood there, transfixed by the immensity of this place, by the construct he had long imagined around this core, the lights seemed to dim, to flicker off. Suddenly, he was in total darkness. He thought he smelled something burning...

  The whispered inquiries he expected from the others never came. This was a major kink in their plan, but no one seemed to notice...

  There was a sudden brilliant flash of light and heat, and Jack was thrown to the wire floor of the platform.

  He saw a light overhead explode, an arc of lightning pass from it to another light, and then towards the mesh.

  He quickly rolled away, leapt to his feet. The lightning followed him, passed through him, sending pain ripping through his already ravaged body. The heat was worse this time than on the roof; this time he burned from the inside. Despite his best efforts he screamed, collapsed to the floor, tried to crawl away the heat and light that crackled through the air around him. Where were the others? Had their suits frozen, were they trapped inside a hundred pounds of armor with no electronics? Surely the purely mechanical systems still functioned.

  More and more arcs of feral electricity filled the air, filled his body. The smell of burning was stronger, now. His vision blurred as his body tried to pull in too many directions at once.

  Suddenly, the pain stopped, though the lightning continued to pass through him. Around him, the core seemed to fade, the concrete and steel melting and reforming into an antiseptic white enclosure, filled with people staring down at him in concern.

  They all moved strangely, stiffly, seeming to walk and talk in reverse. And now Jack's body began to fade. His limbs were still there, but they moved through other limbs, burned, mutilated limbs. His limbs from the week before? No—these were beyond burned. Liquid flesh oozed from cracks in the caramelized skin, veins and vessels rose to the surface, wrapping themselves tightly around the molten flesh. The other body closed around him and—

  Jack jerked upright and opened his eyes. A skeletal face of rough ceramic was staring at him. "The hell is wrong with you?" Naomi's modulated voice asked.

  He stared around wildly. A metal platform, girders beyond that, nine armored forms staring up at him, several heads tilted in curiosity.

  He looked down at his hands—pink and unnaturally glossy, the skin smooth and waxy looking. "Nothing. I'm just getting feedback from all the refugees. They're nervous; I'm nervous."

  Naomi grunted, then gestured to Vince. The elevator began to rise.

  Fifty feet up and they were out of sight of the others.

  "I had a vision," Jack said.

  "I thought you were back up a hundred percent."

  "Not a memory. A vision. Something I've never seen before. There's something else going on here, something we don't know about."

  "Yeah, too bad our main source of intel decided not to talk to us anymore."

  Jack ignored the comment, then dug into his pocket for a pair of ear-plugs.

  Fifty stories up, and the scramblers snapped on. Standing by a single scrambler, unprotected, was enough to cause nausea and disorientation. Standing in a hollow tube, resonating with the pitch of twenty scramblers, was enough to cause a complete consciousness collapse. Even with the earplugs, Jack felt his entire body stiffen, his mind scream for the pain to stop. Beside him Naomi, safely cocooned in her armor, was twitching, her movements wildly exaggerated by the suit.

  "You... you..." Jack took a deep breath, nearly gagged. "You think th-th-the G-General's ab-ble to hand-dle this?"

  Naomi didn't answer; she was finally getting her body back under her control.

  The platform jostled, slowed, stopped. Before them was a hatch, about five feet tall, with a simple latch—no lock. Naomi pushed forward, opened it. Inside was a small room, lit by a thin strip of LEDs that turned on when the door opened. Pipes, cleaning supplies, an electrical box; all was expected. Across the room was another door, set tight into the wall. Naomi pushed, and the door swung open. She slid inside the lair of the beast while Jack waited in the storage room.

  A minute passed in silence, then there was the sound of a scuffle, a heavy thud, Naomi's modulated voice. "He's unconscious. Hurry."

  Jack slid through the door, found himself in a small media room nestled under a second-story loft. Beyond the edge of the loft was Philadelphia, stretching to the horizon, moonlight streaming in and casting harsh shadows around the room.

  "Over here."

  Jack walked over wooden floor until he came to a small sitting area set before the great glass wall. A small figure was slumped in an arm-chair, and the hulking form of Naomi stood off to one side.

  Jack nodded. This would work. "Good job. As soon as the cut comes, I'll jump."

  He waited for a response that didn't come.

  "Naomi?"

  The form in the chair shifted slightly, bringing a gun twinkling into the moonlight. "Hey, Jack. I'm glad you made it."

  Jack bit his lip and lowered his eyes. He had expected this possibility... yet he had hoped it wouldn't come to this. "I've always wanted to ask you how you're able to do this, despite the scramblers."

  If Mistaren was distracted in any way by the question, he didn't show it; the gun remained pointed solidly at Jack. "I'm sorry, but I can't tell you that. The one thing I can't teach you... Personally, I think its genetics."

  The voice was the General's, there was no mistaking it. But the vocabulary, the speech pattern...

  "You know, despite everything that's happened, that will happen, I really did want us to win. To break out when we had the chance."

  "What do you mean 'we?'" Jack was slowly circling towards Naomi. If he could get her rifle, convince Mistaren he really intended to kill him... Assuming he wasn't reading his thoughts.

  "But I guess my own actions betrayed me on that." He sniffed and wiped at his nose. "I'm sorry for getting your hopes up like that, only to turn right around and give you to Ken and the General like that..."

  Jack stopped, his hand reaching towards the rifle, his body frozen, every muscle tensed. "Allen?"

  The form sitting in the chair dipped his head, and for the first time the gun wavered.

  Now was the chance, aim low, incapacitate until the cut—

  "You really think you're the first to have the idea of taking over this body?" H
e stood, holding out his arms, almost inviting Jack to shoot him. "Not the best physical specimen, but he had power in all the right places."

  Jack's hand rested on the but of the rifle, more for support than for supremacy. "How... How long?"

  Mistaren—Allen—shrugged. "About three years. I infected him with the virus during his first visit, kept him completely unaware of his power, scrubbed his memory of the ordeal. Rather like what you two went through. From there it was just a matter of implanting orders to keep him in line up until... That last day."

  The rifle was forgotten now. Jack stepped forward, his life-long struggle to keep his life normal warring with what this man was telling him. "Why? Why do any of that? Why fill our heads with all of that Q-bomb bullshit if you were just going to betray us to the General, become the General?" He couldn't get angry, couldn't let himself be distracted. This man might still be the General, might simply be lying.