The Second Fall

by G J Ogden

  “I should have stopped them!” cried Ethan, his voice hoarse. “I should have made them leave!”

  “It’s not your fault!” cried Summer, as her tears flowed freely. She raked the wetness from her face, scratching more red lines into her cheeks, and shook her hands as if they were covered in acid, splashing blood-stained droplets onto Ethan’s boots. “I’m so sorry, Ethan! I’m so, so sorry!...” Then she pushed herself up and ran away, leaving Ethan utterly alone.

  Chapter 35

  Maria sat in one of the plush, padded chairs that occupied the communal space in the large central area of the engineering complex. It was oddly calm and quiet. Page had gone to get some treatment for his injured arm from Gaia’s medical apprentice and daughter, Kia, and was now resting, largely involuntarily, because of the soporific effects of the drugs. Other than a few giggling children running around the communal space with Yuna in tow (also giggling), everyone was busy making the necessary arrangements to accommodate three hundred new residents. Despite everything that had happened, the mood was hopeful and even upbeat, and certainly the sound of laughter and children playing went a long way to making this once sterile complex seem more alive. Maria relaxed back into the chair and felt her own eyelids start to become heavy. She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, and let the darkness and stillness envelop her.

  “Sleeping on the job?”

  Maria opened her eyes and saw Gaia standing in front of her, holding a PVSM unit. She rubbed her eyes and sat up. “I must have nodded off,” she said, yawning.

  “Well, I am sorry to disturb you,” said Gaia. “If anyone has earned a good rest, it is you. I will come back later.”

  “No, it’s okay.” Maria eyed the PVSM with great interest. “It must be important.”

  Gaia drew up a stool beside Maria’s chair, sat down and held the device out to her. “This is the data processing unit that your friend was wearing when we found him. I mentioned I would try to find it for you.”

  Maria shifted further forward in the chair and reached out hesitantly for the PVSM; her throat had tightened and she felt sick. “May I?”

  “Of course, Maria. It is yours now,” said Gaia, warmly. “I hope it contains something to bring you comfort.” She handed the PVSM to Maria and stood up. “I will leave you now.”

  Maria held the PVSM and turned it over and over in her hands. She looked up to thank Gaia, but she was already walking back towards the newly opened east wings, where the sound of play was filtering through into the communal area. She took a deep breath, held it for a second, and then let it out.

  “Okay, Sal, take it easy. Just turn the damn thing on…” she said in a hushed voice, not that anyone was nearby to overhear.

  Maria placed the PVSM onto her left wrist and hit a button to auto fasten the straps, which rapidly retracted and then adjusted to adapt to the unique contours of Maria’s arm. The various status indicators blinked on and Maria watched them change from red to amber and finally to green. She took another deep breath and then flipped open the display panel; a few tense seconds passed and the display came to life, casting a cool glow across Maria’s face. The display showed the UEC logo and a message stating that access to the device was restricted. She tapped the word, ‘Authorize’ and cleared her throat.

  “Access override, Commander Maria Salus, authentication code, UEC. Three. Seven. Gamma. Echo. Alpha. One.” She waited. Her mouth was dry and she realized her left knee was bobbing up and down uncontrollably. She shifted position in an attempt to steady it and waited. Then the screen flashed and the words, ‘Access Granted’ appeared on the screen, and then quickly faded as the standard UEC user interface loaded. The ident details for Commander Christopher Kurren appeared in the top-right corner, confirming that it was the PVSM of her former partner. Maria was about to start a standard systems diagnostic to make sure the unit was functioning correctly when an alert bleeped, startling her. Maria’s heart thumped in her chest as she read the display and saw that the mission log icon was flashing. She hovered her finger over the icon, pulling back several times and flexing the muscles in her hand, as if limbering them up for a marksmanship contest, and then eventually pressed the icon. A log entry flashed up on screen, dated a few months after Maria had returned to the UEC moon base with Ethan, five years earlier. The log entry was titled, ‘For Sal.’

  Maria shook her head and laughed out loud. “You always did need to have the last word, old man,” she said, though her voice was shaky. She took another deep breath to compose herself as best she could and said, “play log entry.”

  The PVSM screen went blank and a holo image of Chris Kurren appeared in front of her. He was outside, resting against a tree with tree-lined hills in the background. The lighting was subdued, and the time-code read, 20:24. The message began to play. Maria was transfixed as the holo image of Kurren rubbed his eyes and cleared his throat. His face was covered in a roughly trimmed beard and he looked tired, Maria thought, and thinner. A stab of guilt stuck her again, knowing that she had left him to this end, but it also felt good to see him again, and these two conflicting emotions were hard to reconcile.

  “Hey, Sal…” the recording began. “So, I feel kinda dumb recording this, because I know you won’t see it, but what the hell, eh, it’s something to do.” He laughed a wicked laugh, which ended in a throaty cough. “As you can probably see, I’m not exactly at my best right now. I dropped off the red-haired pain-in-the-ass and took off before she woke up and tried to kill me again, so if you ever see that ranger kid, tell him I stuck to my end of the deal, okay?” He coughed again.

  “I know you did, old man,” said Maria, softly.

  “I liked that kid, he had heart. And I know you liked him too, Sal. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but I’ve had time to think on it, and I feel bad for what we made him do. Time is something I’ve had a lot of recently, as you can probably imagine.” Kurren croaked another laugh, wiped spittle from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve, and continued. “I know why we had to do it, but seeing these people down here… it makes me think, you know? Like, how can they all manage to get along, after everything they’ve been though, and we’re still picking fights with GPS? Maybe it’s the meds talking, Sal, I don’t know, but in some way I hope that damn warship is broken and useless. I’d hate that kid to live on knowing how we used him. But, GPS is probably gone by now and so I guess that’s that.”

  Maria watched as Kurren seemed to phase out for a minute, staring off into the distance as if he had been momentarily frozen in time.

  “Anyway, what I wanted to say… why I made this idiotic recording that you’ll never see… is that I don’t want you to blame yourself for me being here. I know you will, but you need to forgive yourself, Sal. There was no choice, and I’m okay with it, I really am.”

  Maria squeezed her eyes shut, but she was unable to stop a tear from flowing. She brushed it away and shook her head, as if she could somehow shake away the sorrow.

  “So, anyway, I hope you’re okay, and I hope you find some closure, you know, for the crap you’ve been through too. You’re a good kid, Sal. A terrible pilot, but a good kid.”

  Maria laughed out loud, causing the image stabilizer of the holo emitter to work overtime as her arm shook along with the rest of her body.

  “As for me, well, I met this crazy old guy a week or so back, and he told me about a cave system up near a flat-topped mountain. It might let me escape this damn radiation, so I’m going to check it out. But, to tell you the truth, Sal, I think this place has done for me already. I probably hit the meds a bit hard, without you telling me not to be so stupid. It’s a shame, because this planet can be something else, Sal, it really can. Some nights I just sit out up on a hill somewhere and look out and… it’s just so damn beautiful… I wish you could see it again, properly this time, like I have. I hope one day you will.”

  Another tear escaped down Maria’s cheek, but this time she did not brush it away. She felt angry, and elated
, and sorrowful, and hopeful all at once; it was a cocktail of emotions so thick and potent that she could do nothing but let it take over.

  “Anyway, that’s really all I have to say. Commander Chris Kurren, signing off!” The last was said with the same mock military gusto that Maria remembered him using with the eleven-year-old Elijah. But then the smile on the ghostly face of Chris Kurren faded. He massaged his chin, thick with wiry bristles, before concentrating into the lens and saying with a softness that Maria had not heard since before his wife and daughter were killed in a GPS attack, when they were both much younger. “I’ll miss you, Sal. Take care of yourself.”

  And then the holo shut off, and the image of Chris Kurren flickered and faded to nothing, leaving Maria huddled over, face in hands, unable to stem the tears that now flowed freely and easy. Her barriers had fallen and, like a dam that suddenly weakened and gave way, there was no stopping the emotions from breaking through and flooding out. Maria remained like this until she had no more tears left to cry; eventually she sat back in the chair and allowed the stillness to wash over her. She felt calm and focused, and with this focus came a sudden clarity. She knew what she had to do.

  “Excuse me, Commander?” Maria looked up, and this time it was Major Page standing in front of her.

  “Am I disturbing you?” he added, noticing the redness of Maria’s cheek of the puffiness around her eyes. “I can come back later if I am.”

  “No, Major, it’s fine,” said Maria, pushing herself out of the chair. It was only then that she noticed he had removed his blue armor and was again wearing the standard, olive green overalls that the scientists and engineers had provided. She could see the webbed ends of a chemical bandage poking out around the edges of his collar, where Kia had patched up his shoulder. “What do you want to speak to me about?”

  “Perhaps now isn’t the time to discuss it,” said Page, shuffling his feet, “but, I was wondering what we do now.”

  Maria’s attention was drawn away briefly by Gaia and the other scientists and engineers gathering in front of the viewing window, overlooking the city.

  “I mean, what do we do now that General Kurren is gone?” added Page, feeling that his question needed the added clarification.

  But Maria knew exactly what he meant. Had the Major asked her only ten minutes earlier, she would have had no idea how to respond, but now the answer was clear to her. She looked into Page’s eyes and without a shred of uncertainty in her voice, she said, “We go back.”

  Page’s eyes widened, but although he was clearly intrigued by her response, he didn’t appear to be shocked by it.

  “We find the shuttle that Kurren used to get planetside, and we go back to the moon base,” Maria went on with calm assuredness. “Your ident will allow us to get through docking control, and once we’re inside we skim past the landing site, ditch the ship and escape through the crawlspaces into the sub-structure. We slip out before anyone knows what happened, and we gather enough support to kick out what’s left of Kurren’s failed regime. With him gone, we can do it, Karl, I have no doubt in my mind that we can.”

  There was silence as the two officers regarded each other; Maria trying to gauge Page’s reaction to her radical proposal, and Page trying to gauge just how serious Maria was about doing what she had suggested.

  “Do you really think there’s anyone left up there who will help us?” said Page, breaking the impasse.

  Maria smiled. “I know so. Raina would not have been the only one to resist. There will be others, working in secret, hiding in plain sight, waiting for a chance. All they need is a spark.”

  “But they also need a leader; someone to ignite that spark,” added Page. “Are you really ready for another fight?”

  “It’s the same fight, major. The same one I’ve been fighting for years. The more important question is, are you ready?”

  Page nodded. “Like I told you, Commander, I’m with you until the very end.”

  “It’s settled then. We go back,” said Maria, decisively.

  “We go back.”

  “I have just one condition.”

  “Name it.”

  “No more ranks. From now on, it’s just Maria, or Sal if you prefer; no more ‘Commander’. That time is past.”

  “You got it, Sal.”

  Maria stretched out her hand and Page took it, shaking it firmly. “Then it’s a deal, Karl.”

  Gaia approached and did an apologetic little cough to get their attention. “We are ready, if you are,” she said. “Though we cannot find Ethan or the other red-haired young woman who recently arrived.”

  Maria faced Gaia; she was feeling energized and invigorated, as if she had taken a double hit of stims and the vitalizing effects had just kicked in.

  “Don’t worry about them,” said Maria, guessing what had probably happened and why they were off the radar. “Let’s just get this done.”

  “Very well,” said Gaia, and she invited them both to follow her and join the rest of the group, looking out at the underground city.

  “Does anyone wish to say a few words?” said Gaia. Everyone looked at one another with blank faces.

  “There’s nothing down there that we need,” said Maria, loudly enough that everyone could hear. “We have everything, right here. So burn it. Let it fall.”

  Gaia gently pressed her lips together and tilted her head to the side; there was nothing more that needed to be said. She looked at Tyler and there was an unspoken understanding between them. The engineer tapped a sequence of commands into a small data pad and, pausing momentarily before entering the last command, he tapped the screen for the final time, then lowered the pad to his side. For a few moments nothing happened and then, block by block, street by street, the city began to erupt into flames. They all watched in silence as the fires illuminated the full scale of the city for the first time. A city frozen in time and crumbling in flame.

  Burn! Maria said to herself as the flames grew hotter and more intense. Let it all burn!

  Chapter 36

  The viewing window had tinted to shade the communal area from the intense light generated by the city in flames on the other side, but Ethan could still see it all clearly. He wondered if this was how the many thousands of other cities would have looked during the time of the Fall, and contrasted his own feelings of calm satisfaction at watching it burn with what must have been the unbridled horror of the planetside civilization at the time. This city had escaped the Fall back then, but history had caught up with it now. Perhaps it was catching up with them all.

  The communal area was buzzing with activity. The resident scientists were taking the adult survivors on a tour, while also surveying their skills and abilities to see how best they could be put to work. Children sat in small groups, busy playing games or pursuing a host of other activities, with Yuna as the ring-leader. It had been obvious to Ethan, and to the others, how naturally Yuna had taken to being with the children, and how they naturally gravitated to her too. A teacher in the making, perhaps, Ethan thought, and certainly a huge improvement on old bald Boucher, the so-called teacher of Forest Gate. Ethan huffed a laugh, remembering Boucher’s shiny, egg-like head and how Elijah had smiled wickedly when Ethan had inadvertently revealed the unkind nickname to him, under his tree on the mound outside the settlement walls. And then his whole body sank, as if the gravity in the room had just increased by a half again, and he felt numb and empty. He had never experienced loss, not really. He’d known people who had died, of course, and he’d felt their absence and the sadness that accompanied it, but this was different. This absence was acute, like he was missing a limb. He had never considered the possibility of being without Elijah and Katie. Foolishly, he had believed them to be somehow immune from real danger – harm was what happened to others, not to them, or to himself and Summer; they were invincible. Sure, they had been through some scrapes together, but they’d always come through okay. Not this time though. This time they were gone, and so was their home, Fo
rest Gate. He remembered the speech he had given to Summer about how home was more than just four walls surrounding a patch of dirt – wisdom that he’d borrowed from the old hermit – but now this seemed like a lie. He felt lost, and out of place, and desperately alone.

  He caught Gaia approaching in his peripheral vision and did his best to straighten up, pushing against the added forces weighing down on him, but the strain of even standing felt almost too much to bear.

  “There you are, Ethan,” Gaia said, gently, as she gingerly approached his side. “I am afraid you missed the small gathering to set the city alight. We did look for you, and your friend; Summer, is it?”

  The mention of Summer’s name felt like a knife in the gut, and from the concerned expression on Gaia’s face, Ethan realized that he must not have hidden this well.

  “Are you okay, Ethan?” asked Gaia, stepping closer and giving Ethan’s arm a reassuring squeeze. Ethan did not want comforting, and he instinctively withdrew, but then tried to cover his obvious retreat by moving closer to the viewing window and staring blankly out through the glass.

  “Why are we not feeling the heat?” he asked, quickly changing the subject to the first unrelated topic that popped into his head. “I mean, from the fires in the city.”

  Gaia frowned, but chose not press Ethan. Instead she moved beside him, this time maintaining a respectful gap, and answered his question. “This complex was designed to be immune from any number of possible disasters that could have befallen the city during its construction. In the event of a failure in the fire suppression systems, such as we have manually engineered, the heat vents upwards, drawn by a network of solar-fueled fans, built into the ceiling of the cavern. Right now, I suspect this mountain looks somewhat like a volcano about to erupt.”