by G. R. Carter
“Good idea, ladies. Just the kind of thinking we need,” Alex said. The thought of how to present this to the Land Lords and the leaders of the other provinces formulated in his mind. “At least we’ll have something positive to talk about when I let everyone know their fuel and ammunition allowances are about to be cut. Tough way to start a meeting.”
Alex limped over and stared out the large windows overlooking the crowds gathered for the annual Founder’s Day celebration. People from all over the Republic made the trip; at least those who could afford to get away for a couple of days. Difficult travel meant that most here were from the Okaw or Old Main, the original two partners in the Republic. But a few straggled in from the provinces once making up New America. The people there were assimilating quickly, a paradox that Alex and his wife Rebekah marveled at whenever the conversation came up. Just a few years before, America had been a mortal enemy of the Republic – now they seemed to be more loyal than some of those who had been with them from the start.
His mother in law had explained the concept as an expert in social studies would, but Julia Ruff’s intellect and education exceeded Alex’s patience for comprehending it. All he knew was that one of his best friends and most trusted colleagues was helping the provinces there. He missed having Martin Fredericks’ advice to lean on daily. But the benefit of having his most capable military officer on the contested border with the Northern Caliphate helped him sleep at night.
Alex watched barbecue smoke rise up from tents arrayed in a midway arrangement, and a few costumed characters entertained the crowds below. Another row of tents formed up behind the carnival, each with a separate flag fluttering above. On Bek’s suggestion they made sure every province in the Republic, along with every ally, had a place for citizens to visit and learn more about their neighbors.
Some had joked about a chamber of commerce meeting being held, but it was much more than that. It was an effort to ensure each person saw themselves as a part of something bigger. Little communication was available in a world of no telephone and no internet. A remote Fortress Farm or another town once accessible in minutes now could take days to reach. The Republic relied heavily on symbolism and the Unified Church to bind everyone together, no matter where they lived. That was if they could get everyone to agree that working together really was the goal.
Regional rivalries were already flaring up. The Hamilton and Ruff families had made it their mission to be allies with any civilized group they came in contact with. Republic aid via Quarterbushels and food supplies served as an investment in the long-term future of their own people, not just a bribe. But Alex and Bek knew some nations had bigger plans; including partners with them from the early days, right after the Great Reset shut down the electronic world.
The thought turned his gaze to the group that concerned him most. A black banner with a white lambda in the middle waved on the tallest pole in the entire row of diplomatic tents. Tony Diamante was nearly as close to Alex as his brother Sam or Martin. Tony’s Peacekeeper forces had even saved his life, and the Republic’s capital city, in the attack that damaged so much of his body. In turn, the Republic had made available a steady stream of biofuel and food to the mostly urban society that had no idea how to feed itself after the government rations they captured ran out. The Republic Archives, essentially a post-Reset Library of Congress, gave Nicole Diamante and ARK’s engineers the plans they needed to create miracles of their own. Theirs was a perfect partnership, the urban society with the last known functioning computer on the planet, and the rural resource powerhouse able to feed not only their own people but everyone else’s as well.
But more than just the weather was chilled these days. For the first time ever, neither Tony nor Nicole made the 120-mile trip to celebrate Founder’s Day with the Hamiltons. Alex understood the reasons. Even with their own personal airship, the Diamantes were always busy somewhere. Still, the relationship just wasn’t as close as before.
“Quarter for your thoughts?” Celeste asked.
“Just wondering if ARK had enough of everything? They haven’t purchased fuel or food off of us in a while. How are they making it?”
“Maybe Paul can answer that?” Celeste said.
Alex was embarrassed, forgetting Paul was still in the room. He turned to address his old friend. “Right. Paul, do you know?”
“Nicole says their facilities are barely keeping up. That’s one of my primary responsibilities, to increase production. Remember, they operate in tighter areas than we…you do. And they don’t subsidize places like Mt. Horab,” Kelley replied.
Alex noticed the specific reference and thought it over for a few moments, then smiled as brightly as he could at everyone in the room. “Would you all please excuse us? I have a few things I need to address, and I’m sure you all have better things to do than sit and watch me think.”
Nervous chuckles, the kind underlings give to patronize their superiors, rippled through the room. A wave of commotion followed as chairs slid and papers rustled as each person not related to the family in some way quickly left.
“I’m sorry, Paul,” Alex said. “I need to speak with my sisters about a few things. Would you mind?”
Paul’s face looked hurt and surprised, then glanced over at Bishop Hart who clearly wasn’t leaving. Then the realization set in. He was officially out of Alex’s inner circle. Without a word he gathered his things and left the room, leaving Alex with Lori, Celeste and Bishop Hart.
Without being prodded, Celeste began the conversation. “You think they’re getting fuel from Little Egypt?”
“It’s Grand Shawnee now,” Alex corrected with a smirk.
“Whatever,” she replied testily. “You think Eric’s selling them fuel on the side from the oil fields down there?”
“Possibly. Though I think we’d see it. How would they get it across the river without going over the bridges? Each truck has to be checked in and out over the border.”
Celeste thought for a moment, pulling up maps in her mind. “Pipeline Bridge at Grand Tower,” she said. “It’s not used for traffic, it’s literally just a pipeline over the river. Used to carry natural gas all the way from Texas to Chicago in the old days. I suppose they could be pumping through that.”
“Would Eric do that to us?” Lori asked about her ex-fiancé. “He’s a lot of things, but I don’t think he’s a thief.”
“It wouldn’t technically be stealing. I gave him free reign to build that province up. And he’s certainly done that. Definitely bad faith not to tell us though,” Alex said.
“Just the sort of thing Maryanne and her creepy cadre would pull,” Celeste said with clear distaste. Neither of the Olsens were present this week, instead sending Marcus Nielsen and Demetrius Renaldo to represent the province. The Hamiltons had briefly exchanged greetings with the two, but that was it.
“I bet Eric doesn’t even know. But I suppose that would explain how they’ve gained so much wealth so quickly,” Lori said.
“So, ARK makes a special deal with Maryanne to get fuel. Why cut us out of the information loop? I would have approved it anyway,” Alex asked.
“Probably because you agreed to help Mt. Horab,” Bishop Hart offered.
“Do they really hate them that much?” Lori asked.
“Bek said the ARK Peacekeepers wouldn’t even speak to anyone during the last academy session at Old Main. Especially the Buckles. That was the last class ARK is sending over, their officers won’t train here anymore,” Alex said. “All they did was joke about owning the rivers.”
“And you can’t own the rivers without owning all the cities along the river banks. Well, Essie Hamilton isn’t going to agree to that, is she?” Celeste laughed. Essie was engaged to a member of Mt. Horab’s ruling council, a fervent adherent to the Unified Church, and no fan of ARK’s.
Alex shook his head with a grin. “She’s just like Sam. An idealist and a pilot through and through. You did your job on that one, Bishop.”
�
�I didn’t convert, I merely channeled what was already there,” Hart laughed. “Now, if we could have the same outcome with our efforts in ARK and Vincennes that would be a true miracle.”
The smile left Alex’s face. He looked back out the window, trying to picture the wheels within wheels that made life and death struggles grind. His mind was still famous for understanding strategy, even if his body was broken. “Something else is at work here,” he said to no one in particular. “There’s definitely someone…some force we can’t recognize that doesn’t want the same things we want.”
Chapter Two
Renaissance Tower
Downtown ARK City
Premier Tony Diamante’s Office
Year 12 A.G.R. (After the Great Reset)
Tony loved the City. His City. Standing in his glass enclosed office, looking out at the Arch gleaming in the glow of the Solar Storms, he felt the energy. ARK City’s predecessor had once been the Gateway to the West, the capital of the United States’ frontier. At her peak, St. Louis rivaled the great cities of the world in commerce and strategic importance. What then served as the world’s greatest commercial highway flowed just past the City’s landmark monument; a river once connecting - now divided.
The half-century before man’s hubris failed and the lights went out across the world had been tough on his city. Failures of leadership and shifts in demographics left the once proud launchpad of western expansion teetering on the brink of collapse. The Diamantes and a few others managed to adapt and retain fabulous wealth with diversified businesses, but everyone knew time was running out; a long, slow decline would continue just as it had for so many Midwestern cities built around industry.
The Reset was the coup de grace for most populated areas of the world; cities new and old fell to the chaos of electronic junkies cut off from their drug of choice. Only strategic planning, quick action, and willingness to make tough decisions had allowed the Diamantes to save the part of St. Louis that really mattered, the bones of what was now the creature known as ARK. This was his City. He saved it, built it, loved it and cared for it—his City.
ARK was expanding. Twelve years after the Reset, the population of approximately 11,000 people he had saved from certain death had swelled into the hundreds of thousands, probably over a million by now. Humans turned out to be a resilient species, and even losing nine out of every ten to starvation, disease and violence left a lot of survivors in densely populated countries like the old United States. The question was what type of person would survive; would they be productive contributors, or savages tormented by what they had done to survive the dying days?
ARK’s experience found both. Tony’s Peacekeeper forces found pockets of civilization everywhere they went, people who had banded together to try and save what they could, to protect their children and whatever future might be made in the ruins. There were numerous small towns west of ARK, spreading out to the nearly infinite horizon of North America. The little oases held on, knowing the clock was ticking as they ran out of scavenged food and took crash courses in life skills on a scale large enough to provide enough calories for their communities.
Likewise, the ammunition so critical for self-defense and hunting didn’t last long. This was rural country, better suited to stockpiles of weapons than nearly anywhere on the continent. But what had seemed like large stores of supplies before were consumed quickly in an effort to fend off mobs of starving and desperate people fleeing the cities. Those able to hold out against the onslaught then faced the dilemma of using the rest of their ammunition to hunt for any animals they could to build a food bridge between the immediate needs of survival and the time when communities could once again produce what they needed.
Most of these communities regarded ARK Peacekeepers as saviors when their jeeps rolled into town. With plenty of food supplies gained by their relationship with their Red Hawk allies, ARK used rations to gain the trust and loyalty of normally suspicious survivors. An offer of ARK Citizenship to community leaders helped populations acquiesce to new loyalties; most grasped their current plights were desperate anyway—what was there to lose? Those new Citizens were offered the opportunity to visit ARK, a chance to see a functioning city with running water, secure streets and even the steady glow of bountiful electricity coming from river turbines. They were given a tour of Renaissance Tower, the capitol building of ARK and home to the only known functioning computer in world. After months of struggle just to survive in the most basic terms, the city of ARK’s shining white towers looked like Valhalla itself. A renewed and reenergized band of converts then returned to their towns, determined to make a name for themselves and perhaps even secure their own residence in one of the City Center towers someday.
The system spread like wildfire. Each added community created an expense to ARK at first, but quickly became an asset as goods and resources began to flow back to the capital. With the expertise of ARK’s engineers, the outposts, deemed waypoints in ARK terminology, began to produce timber and food first. Defenses improved to allow a minimal number of residents to hold out against the ever-present bandits lurking in the surrounding wildlands. ARK skyships soon patrolled overhead, spotting nests of bandits, then Peacekeepers led local militias to wipe out any troublemakers. Militiamen with a particular aptitude for fighting were rewarded with a commission in the Peacekeepers, allowing the force to not only replace losses incurred during the expansion but also grow by double and then triple within a very short period of time. A three-year successful stint in the Peacekeepers was rewarded with Citizenship, a goal that each young person began to aspire to once the benefits became well known.
Communities missed the presence of their strongest young people. But improved defenses, no more outlaws and the promise of Peacekeeper support in times of trouble made the opportunity for their children to gain Citizenship a cause for celebration. A little extra hard work by those left behind was a small price to pay for a full stomach and a chance for young people to have a future.
Success also drew refugees from areas bypassed by ARK’s strategic plan or unable to wait to be assimilated. Huge numbers of the desperate creatures were camped out just across the river right now. Tony could see countless campfires spread out over the parking lots of the industrial wasteland that was once the Illinois side of the river. Peacekeepers had run off the initial waves, but Nicole realized some might be useful. So the hopeful waited in subsistence conditions for ARK interviewers to review their skills and backgrounds, looking for those with something to contribute to the western expansion. So many were available, he even let ARK’s eastern allies pick through a few immigrants for their own needs. Decent labor was always in short supply, especially reliable and intelligent types; the post-Reset world was no different than the past in that regard.
Tony, and Nicole, were proud of the system they had built. Feudalism was an ugly word, even among the mis-educated. Neither thought the term was fair to use. Frankly neither cared to characterize it all. Political theory was a luxury of a bygone age, when well-fed professors and politicians argued over perfect worlds. This was an age of action, a time to save as many people as possible for the good of the future. There was no reason the people responsible for that salvation shouldn’t be well rewarded for their efforts. And it did take effort, tremendous effort.
Tony reluctantly turned from his beloved view. He had work to do yet tonight, strategic planning for ARK’s nonstop push to expand.
“This would be a lot easier if you would have talked the Hamiltons into letting us have Grand Shawnee,” Kathy Kingsley said to Tony. She was standing next to the map wall, which was literally what the name implied: a huge, incredibly detailed map recreating every major road, hill, town and stream west of the Mississippi River all the way to the Rocky Mountains—and there was room on the wall for what lie further west.
Tony shrugged. “Hardly any people there. Citizens would have trouble finding decent workers for their estates. We’ve got plenty to work with for now.”
“No people, but that whole area’s got a chance to be the Saudi Arabia of coal. Timber, too, and we need to keep control of the rivers. Water will be the best way to move cargo and large groups of people around for the next hundred years. Longer, maybe,” Kathy argued back. She was more than just the Minister of Resources in ARK, she was also Tony’s cousin. Family could speak to the Premier like no other Citizen could (in private of course).
“As long as we can trade for coal and oil from Shawnee, it’s just as good as holding the area. That forest is a headache, crawling with rateaters. The Republic can’t grow, Vincennes will keep them hemmed in on the east…within a generation they’ll be a fraction of our size, then we can set the terms we need. The Olsens would turn it over to us if we asked, but let them do the heavy lifting of getting the place rebuilt. Heck, the next generation of Hamiltons will probably want to be ARK citizens themselves someday.”
Kathy nearly choked on her ever-present water bottle. “I thought they were your best friends, Tony. What happened to them being trusted allies? Remember that lecture you always give us?”
“They are allies. And I do like Alex and Bek. Sam, too, although that Martin Fredericks guy is one to watch. He doesn’t care for us and he’s got Alex’s ear. Former soldier in the U.S. military, real law-and-order type. Doesn’t like the Republic being mixed up with people of our background. I sensed it when we were planning the attack on the New America HQ. Bobby told me he was very standoffish when Fredericks spoke at the last academy graduation ceremony. Alex only trusts Bek and Sam more than him, so that’s something we’ll have to manage. Julia Ruff’s the same way, she knows more about what really happened at the Reset than she lets on. Too fond of the Buckles, also.”
