Aftermath a-1

by Charles Sheffield

  “Mr. President,” Kennecott said. “This is Dr. Madeleine Liebchen. She is the person best qualified to answer any technical questions you may have.”

  Liebchen. Little love. Saul did the translation instinctively as he shook her hand. I think not. Eyes of a wonderful sapphire blue gazed coldly into his.

  That look of unconcealed contempt gave Saul another reason why Captain Kennecott was likely to accompany them everywhere. I am President of all the people — if they will allow it. Many people disliked politicians. A rather smaller number hated them. A few went past that, and tried to kill them. Saul possessed various built-in protections, painfully installed after nomination night. His blood seethed with morphing antibodies, supposedly able to handle any natural or manufactured virus or bacterium (including the interlocking plasmid composite that got President Johannsen, in ’18; it was the top-secret pictures of Johannsen’s corpse, bloated so that the nose was no more than a dimple in the swollen head and the testicles were the size of grapefruit, that had persuaded Saul to take the treatment).

  The implant in the roof of his mouth offered different protection. It would supposedly detect a million different poisons alone or in lethal combination, and trigger an involuntary regurgitation reflex. Except that the damned thing surely wouldn’t work at all now, since all the chips had gone belly-up.

  Saul took a second look at the scowling Dr. Liebchen. No virus, and perhaps no poisons, but that still left bullets, bombs, teeth, wild animals, knives, nooses, and nuclear weapons.

  Dr. Liebchen was probably just a woman who regarded politics and politicians as beneath her. That did not make her dangerous. Kennecott must know her well. He did not judge her a threat. But how well had Johannsen’s sister known Eileen Wilmore Bretherton, when she brought her to that fatal dinner?

  Unlike one of his less illustrious predecessors, Saul could chew gum and walk (oral history suggested a more basic body function) at the same time. He could in fact do much more. While his internal thoughts reviewed the fate and frailties of past Presidents, he offered polite conversation to Kennecott and Liebchen. And at the same time he examined a variety of proximity fuses, artillery and artillery shells, rockets and rocket launchers, mines, torpedoes, and depth charges, all massed in tight phalanxes along the building’s concrete floor.

  After ten minutes he halted. The entourage came to a stop with him. “Captain. Dr. Liebchen. When I asked to see the weapons stored here, I meant active, usable weapons. This seems more like a museum.” He gestured around him. “I know the Indian Head facility contained modern weapons, but everything here is very old. Those torpedoes . . .”

  Dr. Liebchen said in a brittle voice, “Every one of the weapons you are looking at is in perfect working order. If you would care for a demonstration—”

  “Allow me, Madeleine. I know you never take credit.” Captain Kennecott stepped in front of her. “Mr. President, when this base was hit by the gamma pulse we lost all external communications. For the first seventy-two hours I did not know if we were dealing with a natural phenomenon or the first stage of an external attack. It seemed safer to assume the latter. Dr. Liebchen’s discovery that many of our weapons were useless seemed to reinforce the notion of a coming assault by external agencies. Without direct orders, Dr. Liebchen embarked at once on an all-out night-and-day effort to divide the weapons stored here into two classes: working and nonworking. At first it seemed that the division was chronological. Old weapons worked, newer ones did not. As the effort proceeded, Dr. Liebchen determined that the problem was in fact electronic in nature. A wide class of electronic devices no longer functioned at all. New weapons are more dependent on such devices. The age correlation was an effect, not a cause.” Kennecott swept his arm around to cover the whole building. “Everything here may look old — and be old — but it works. If Indian Head were called upon for combat support, today, thanks to Dr. Liebchen’s tireless efforts we would be able to provide it.”

  “My congratulations to everyone here.” Saul turned back to Madeleine Liebchen. “Particularly to you, Doctor. And the other weapons, the new ones that don’t work?”

  “They are separately warehoused, pending a decision as to their disposal.” The bright blue eyes were no longer cold. They were sparkling. Saul was not naive enough to take credit. It wasn’t his praise, or anything else he had done. It was pure passion for her work. Madeleine Liebchen had done a superior job, and took pleasure in that.

  She went on, “The nature of the malfunctions soon made it clear that the problem lay in the microchips. They cannot be repaired. They must be replaced. I could do that work, in many cases — if there were a source of replacements. But recent contact with other defense facilities suggests no such possibility in the immediate future.”

  “Have you been able to do an assessment of your overall war-fighting support potential, compared with that before the gamma pulse?” Saul had picked up a good deal of military jargon from General Grace Mackay.

  “It is between seventy and one hundred and forty percent.” Dr. Liebchen answered without hesitation.

  “One hundred and forty! You mean you might be more able to provide support now?”

  “No. I mean that the answer to your question depends upon the nature of the assumed threat. The seventy percent number measures our support capability compared with its level before the gamma pulse, against an adversary whose fighting potential is unaffected by the pulse. That is not at all a reasonable scenario. Therefore, I estimated the effects of the pulse in diminishing adversarial war-fighting capability. To do so, I made use of previous estimates of the technological basis for foreign weapons. It turns out that our most likely and formidable potential foes — the Golden Ring compact — rely on chip-based weaponry even more than we do. We are, in that sense, better off — one hundred and forty percent better off — than before. Is that clear?”

  “Perfectly clear.” Saul wanted to add, Dr. Liebchen, I think you are absolutely wonderful. How about a job in Washington?

  He had enough sense not to say any of that (although the offer of a Washington position would indeed come, via Grace Mackay). What was Madeleine Liebchen doing here, in the middle of nowhere? Maybe she was a wind-and-water fanatic, as her ruined complexion suggested. Saul, whose idea of wide-open spaces was the atrium of a big hotel, was not going to find out. He went on, “I am terrifically impressed by the speed with which you have reacted to a unique problem.”

  “Thank you, Mr. President,” Captain Kennecott said gruffly. “We just think of it as standard operations, Navy style. I’m sure other naval facilities have done no less. Shall we continue the tour of inspection?”

  “Certainly.” Saul had learned something enormously important in the tour of Indian Head. He couldn’t yet say quite what it was. Everything had to ferment for an hour or a day in the murky wort of his subconscious, then he would know.

  They moved on, wandering through the married housing with its children’s playground, past the deserted gymnasium, into the dusty library. Lots of old books there, and in the aisles between the stacks the forlorn and useless terminals. Beside the buildings, heaps of snow had a shrunken, defeated look. Clouds of gnats burst from the shade of towering magnolias, heading for sweaty faces and every square inch of exposed skin. The tall privet hedge on the road to the dead weapons warehouse, confused by weather that made no sense, had blossomed in a wild, perfumed, over-the-top-boys-it’s-now-or-never riot of white.

  Saul was having the same spring-is-busting-out feelings. Indian Head had been a stimulant and a restorative — even the cathartic session with Yasmin felt full of future promise. He looked fondly on everything, including Dr. Liebchen, and did not mind when she frowned back at him.

  At the entrance to another anonymous warehouse, he paused. Magnolias and munitions were all very well, but it was reality time. Washington waited.

  “Captain Kennecott, this has been so interesting, I’ve lost track of everything. What time is it?”

  “Ten
minutes before noon, Mr. President.” The captain apparently had access to the Great Chronometer of the Universe, or at least a wholly nondigital watch.

  “So late? I had no idea. I’m afraid I must be leaving. I must be back at the White House this afternoon.”

  He had expected at least a token expression of regret. Kennecott said only, “Yes, Mr. President,” but Saul was trained in nuances. He heard unexpected satisfaction in the captain’s voice, and he caught the rapid eye contact with Dr. Liebchen.

  It could be simple relief at getting rid of him, but Saul didn’t believe it. The pair of them were up to something. He would have suspected a formal salute and maybe the presentation of a memento of Indian Head, except that it was such a mismatch with his mental picture of Madeleine Liebchen. She would recoil at the notion of lapel pins and ceremonial farewells.

  He was right, and he was wrong.

  Saul and his band of followers and security staff walked back toward the river. The memento was waiting behind Mix House. A gigantic gray machine stood on a level concrete pad forty yards from the water, its forty-foot rotors drooping.

  “All yours,” Captain Kennecott said. “Of course, you might say that as Commander in Chief it was yours already. And it is rather old. But we can guarantee this machine is perfectly airworthy. We’d be honored if you would take it for your use in Washington, maybe station it at Andrews AFB along with Air Force One.”

  “What model is this?” Saul didn’t want to mention that he couldn’t identify most modern fighters, still less an ancient helicopter.

  “A Sikorsky CH-53A — a Sea Stallion. It went out of use more than thirty years ago, but I’ll still take it over most modern choppers.” Kennecott patted the side of the monster affectionately. “Carries eight tons, travels five hundred miles at up to a hundred and seventy knots. You and your whole party can be landing on the White House lawn in twenty minutes.”

  Twenty minutes. No leisurely return trip, then, but Saul didn’t regret that. He shook hands all around and his thanks to Captain Kennecott were totally sincere. From the moment when he saw the Sea Stallion, he had known what needed to be done when he arrived back at the White House.

  As Saul climbed into the helicopter’s great hollow interior, big enough to take a fair-sized truck, another thought hit him.

  Washington waited. Tricia also waited. In six hours, he would be face-to-face with her for the first time in over two years.

  26

  From the secret diary of Oliver Guest.

  Never match wits with a Jesuit. I don’t claim that was my waking thought, because in those first few minutes I either had no thoughts at all or I did not later remember them. Returning from the dead is nothing if not confusing.

  But I did think about Father Carmelo Diaz and the deal that we had made. Then not long afterward I realized that my eyes were open. I could see a light. I also realized that someone was speaking, although not to me; and I found that I could not move a muscle, not even an eye muscle. This was terribly frustrating. I saw only what was right in front of me, and that badly out of focus.

  Wherever I was, and whenever I was, I knew two things with certainty: I was alive; and I was not undergoing a standard revivification.

  Not, at least, revivification as it had been known at the time of my descent into abyssal sleep in the year 2021. For of course, I assumed on waking that I had been in abyssal sleep. Only later did I learn otherwise. So my mind said, this is 2621. I have served my sentence, and I have survived.

  Consciousness was not continuous. Clouds of darkness billowed in and out. In random snapshots, by a weak and flickering light, I saw people.

  First it was a stocky, strongly built man with ill-cut short hair and a two-week stubble of black beard. He was dressed in grubby black pants and jacket, and he was wrapping a blanket around me.

  A total collapse of civilization, with this as a specimen of degraded humanity? Possible, but not plausible. What he said was nothing out of the ordinary ("He’s a weight. We’ll have one hell of a time gettin him down them stairs ’less he can walk.") but the accent was pure West Virginia. I couldn’t believe that the dialect would have survived unchanged over six centuries. Could he be a criminal, sentenced like me in 2021 and only recently revived?

  Someone else was behind me, moving my head. A woman’s voice sounded close to my ear; low, pleasant, New England. I made a huge but unsuccessful attempt to turn and look in that direction. Another man moved across my field of vision. He was older than the first by fifteen to twenty years, but just as badly dressed. As he peered intently into my eyes, he said, “There’s no pain when you wake up, but sensory systems respond before motor systems.”

  Local accent, Baltimore-Washington corridor, for a guess. I didn’t think he was talking to me. I was just a piece of near-dead meat, and his words were addressed to his companions. He was right about the lack of motor control, wrong about the pain. I was on fire from head to toes, and I couldn’t even moan.

  I suffered another welcome voyage to nowhere, short or long. When I came back there was less burning in my veins, and a new urgency in West Virginia’s voice. “We’re in trouble, amigos, like Dana says. Question is, what we gonna do? We’ve come too far to give up now.”

  Even crumbs are welcome when you are starving. Dana. I had a name.

  Baltimore answered, “Only one thing for it. He has to go back in the drawer for a while, and we have to split up.”

  “Why, Art?” It was the woman. “Why not all go to the ground floor together, and try to talk our way out of it? We can say we came to look for a friend who’d been put here. We found the gate open — which is true — and we found him dead. Whoever they are, they’d have no reason to think we were lying.”

  “No good,” West Virginia said. “We might be able to talk our way clear. But what if Joy boy here gets so he can move while we’re doin’ it, an’ starts rattlin’ his cage? We’d be in deep shit. An’ no matter what happened they’d have old Ollie instead of us.”

  “But what else can we do, Seth?”

  “Art’s right. We split up. Here’s my suggestion. You an’ Art go do your song an’ dance for whoever’s down there. Before that, you stick me an’ Dr. G. back in his body drawer, both of us together. I’ll take responsibility for keepin’ him quiet — one way or another.” His voice took on a sly and mocking tone. “ ’Less you want to switch, sweetheart, an’ you cuddle up with Doctor De-mento. You ever get cozy with a homicidal maniac?”

  I knew two more things with reasonable certainty. One: I could not be six hundred years in the future. All the speech patterns were too little changed. Two: West Virginia Seth was not my first choice as a dinner companion. I would find a way to get rid of him.

  Not today, though. I needed a lot of information about my present surroundings before I made any moves. I also had as little control over my own body as a dead pig. The three of them grabbed me. There was a good deal more talk among them, that I was too sick or bewildered to follow. My carcass, attired from the feel of it in the same ragtag assortment of clothing as my captors/saviors, was rolled unceremoniously into a deep drawer. One of the people — presumably Seth — squeezed in next to me. The drawer silently closed.

  I lay in darkness for an indefinite period. I think I may have been unconscious again, for after a faint and distant sound of voices and the soft breathing of my companion, I heard nothing at all. My first intimation of returning body control was the sound of a groan — my own.

  A hand covered my mouth. At the same time I felt a stab of pain in my chest.

  “Feel that?” Seth whispered in the darkness. “I hope you can — for your sake. You want to live, you lie still an’ do what I say. One false move, one squeak, the knife goes through your heart. You hear me?”

  I did not point out to him that his own rules presented me with an insoluble problem. If I replied or did not reply, I would be stabbed. Nor, despite increasing evidence of returning muscular control, was it at all clear to me th
at I could answer. What I could and did do was gasp.

  The knife pricked harder. “You are awake. Say something — softly.”

  “Muscles.” My throat was full of phlegm, but I hoped he could understand my gargle. “Cramps. Bad.”

  “All right. I’ll try to help you through. Keep as quiet as you can, an’ let me know if 1 hafta muffle you.”

  I did not ask how. I lay, cold but sweating, as cramps attacked every muscle of my body in turn. After the first two I didn’t need to say a word.

  West Virginia Seth felt what was coming and covered my mouth with his scarf until the spasm was over.

  After a while, between bouts, I said, “What year is it?”

  He didn’t run me through the heart. He said, “What?”

  “What year is this?”

  “2026. Are you Dr. Oliver Guest?”

  “Yes.”

  “The telomere treatment pioneer?”

  “Yes.”

  Another surprise. A more natural next question would have been, “The serial child murderer?” Like me, West Virginia Seth had his own unusual priorities.

  That was the end of the conversation for a while. I pursued my own thoughts and I assume that he followed his. Before the cramps had run their course, thirst took over as a worse torment. I tried to sit up. He restrained me with a rough hand on my chest and a terse “Quit that.”

  “I don’t care what you do to me,” I said. “I have to drink, or die.”

  “You might do both. You oughta be used to dying.” But he wriggled around in some way I could not see, and the body drawer moved out on its runners. “Been a while since I heard anythin’. Let’s see if Art an’ Dana handled ’em.”

  I could walk, but barely. The hardest part was the descent from the body drawer. After that I had a strong arm and the stair rail to help me. As we approached the ground floor the unmistakable stench of decomposing human flesh assailed my nostrils. Previous experience, both professional and personal, allowed me to ignore it.