by C. G. Cooper
I won’t fail. I won’t fail.
I purposely ignored the time. I didn’t want to know how far we’d gone. It was one less thing for them to quiz me about.
Habit? Maybe.
I think that I just didn’t want to be in the spotlight any more than I had to be. It was better not to be curious. My thoughts veered back to my family, back to Gregor’s safe haven. He owed me. He could help me build something like that. I could defend a hill home against a hoard of Mongols. Maybe that was something to think about, something to request.
“Thirty seconds,” the autopilot’s voice announced over the aircraft’s intercom.
The autopilot was good. I didn’t even feel the bird touch down.
A second later Gregor was up and grasping the hatch.
“You ready for your audience with the king?” he asked, grinning obnoxiously.
“Just open the door.”
He got the drift and opened the hatch. What greeted us made me squint, the artificial lights attacking my muted vision like poison darts.
“Where the hell are we?” I asked as I exited the Viper, shielding my eyes with one hand.
Gregor answered with as much awe in his voice as I felt, while we stood gazing over the vastness of what my vision beheld.
“Welcome to The Fed, Ryker.”
Chapter 29
It’s hard to say what I expected. Months before, I really thought any former American federal entity had been eradicated. Every indication told me they were gone. I’d lost friends who were in the federal service. Well, friends and family.
I had expected an entourage of some sort, maybe a line of armed sentries waiting for us. But there was nothing, just a landing pad in the middle of a brightly lit cavern. No, not a cavern, but instead more like the inside of something huge. The place could have housed a hundred of The Tennessee Zone’s Headquarters.
The place was lush and the smell was somewhere between a rain forest and an evergreen forest. I could feel the humidity, and while it wasn’t in the least bit uncomfortable, it was a strange sensation considering the possibilities running through my head mere minutes before.
“Can you believe this?” Gregor inquired breathlessly, taking in the view with wide eyes.
“I can’t,” I replied, trying to make sense of it all. There were distant shapes of buildings, not overgrown, but perfectly situated between trees and rolling fields of green. “Wait, you’ve never been here before?”
“Nope.”
And then I heard it, distant at first and then coming closer. It was a soft electrical whining. Some kind of vehicle.
“Where is everyone?” I asked.
“Our orders were to wait here,” Gregor said, still staring at the jaw-dropping panorama.
And then it came into view, not a column of troops, not even a convoy of vehicles, but a small electric-driven golf cart with one person inside. I could see the driver was a woman, her hair color in stark contrast to her dark clothing.
“Who do you think it is?” Gregor asked, as curious as me.
“You’ve got me.”
The golf cart pulled up next to us, and the young woman smiled at us pleasantly. She couldn’t be older than twenty.
“Good afternoon, gentlemen,” she said. “Would you please hop in back?”
Her voice was soft, and she seemed shy.
“Both of us?” Gregor asked.
“Yes, please,” the girl answered.
The ride wasn’t long. It gave me just enough time to see that the long lost forest of The Fed was completely manmade. An unpracticed eye might not have spotted it, but someone accustomed to the randomness of nature could pick out the deliberate planning of the environment. Everything was well-kept, including the grass and the trimmed trees. It was all far from wild, and I wondered what kind of army they employed to maintain such a perfect landscape.
Our journey ended (but, in a way it had just begun) inside a stone wall, where a thick door stood. It was expansive enough to allow a space shuttle through. There were no buttons to press, and the doors slid open without our driver doing or saying a thing. There must be hidden cameras, I thought. They were hidden quite well, because I couldn’t spot them.
We parked fifty feet inside, and our quiet driver got out.
“Sir, if you’ll please wait here,” she said to Gregor. “I’ll be right back with some lunch for you.”
Gregor was obviously upset to be left behind, but being a good soldier, he just nodded in compliance.
I followed my blonde guide past an unmanned checkpoint, and the automatic gate opened letting us pass through. My curiosity got the best of me.
“How many people work here?” I asked.
She turned, offering me a little smile. She said, “I’m not supposed to say.”
“Can I at least ask your name?”
She actually blushed. “Scarlett.”
Scarlett picked up the pace down the long hallway. We went down first one set of stairs and then another. Finally, we came to a bank of elevators. I counted ten elevators, all oriented like something out of a grand hotel, or maybe the Pentagon. It gave the sensation of being inside a mausoleum.
There was an impressive line of buttons inside the elevator we’d entered, and, after submitting herself to a retina scan, Scarlett chose a button one quarter of the way down. The elevator made a whooshing sound, and we were off. Other than the occasional vibration, I could barely tell we were moving.
The ride ended soon afterward, and the doors opened onto a nearly identical bank of elevators. Scarlett turned left and chose the first door we encountered. The decor inside was comfortable and decorated in bank-like utilitarian.
“He’s waiting for you,” Scarlett said, pointing to a door at the other end of the office. Then she took a seat behind a tidy desk and proceeded to ignore me. With no explanation forthcoming, I walked to the door and knocked.
“Come in,” came a voice from inside.
I stepped inside and saw the back of a silver-haired head.
“Please, have a seat,” said the man, pointing to a chair across from him.
My first impression was of a very old and fragile-looking man. When I got around to where I could see the man better, I nearly fell over.
“Mister Vice President?” I asked.
He looked up at me, squinting.
“Do I know…?” He took a violent breath in, and I thought he was going to have a heart attack. “My God, it can’t be you. But your name…?”
“I changed it,” I said simply, sitting down slowly, staring at the man I’d known before The Collapse.
It took him a second to regain his composure. He’d been such a force when I’d known him, a man of both physical and political stature.
“It looks like we both have some explaining to do,” he said, shaking his head in wonder. “The last time I saw you was when the President…”
“Yeah,” I interrupted. “That was a long time ago.”
We were both silent for a minute, remembering that time, even though neither of us wanted to. Those were the dark days, and days I’d rather forget.
“Do you miss it? Do you miss those times?” he asked.
“I do miss being able to order a pizza whenever I want,” I said, dodging the question with a chuckle.
He looked at me with those inquisitive eyes, exactly like my boy Andrew would. They were so similar in the way they dissected a person or a situation. I remembered that well. Vice President Harry Tomlin only had to look at you to know the truth.
But he laughed now, the laugh of a man who no longer cared about pomp or circumstance. Now he seemed more like an uncle you hadn’t seen in years. His eyes softened and he said, “To be honest, I miss it too. But I don’t think you came all this way to talk about pizza, am I correct?”
“I came because I was summoned, Mister Vice President.”
“About that,” he made a face, one that I couldn’t place. Like he was reluctant, or maybe annoyed, to tell me somethin
g. “I guess you could call me the president now, at least the acting one.”
“I didn’t know.” And that was the truth. When the world went to hell, no one knew what happened. It all happened so quickly. First, there was the dissolution, and then The Fed went quiet, like it had never even existed.
“Well, it’s not like I hold any sort of power,” he explained. “I guess you could call me a figurehead, one with a very small staff. Most days I feel more like a caretaker.”
That made me think about the lack of personnel at the gates, and the girl who’d ferried me to the president’s office.
“But, how does this place run? There have to be hundreds, if not thousands, of workers.”
The president shook his head. “All will be revealed in time, I’m sure. Including Scarlett, who just happens to be my daughter, the number of staff currently working for me is under twenty.”
Less than twenty staff members? How was that possible?
“What about the rest of the cabinet, the advisors, the staffers?” I pictured their faces, knew their names, and I even remembered their families.
“When we handed power back to The Zones, most went back to their homes, at least those still living. Others, over time, have scattered, and still more have died since. None of us are as young as we used to be.” He waved a hand over his withered body as an example.
“So few. How…what…?”
“The Collapse stole more than just our old way of life. For many, it stole our will to live. We are what’s left.”
I shook my head, hoping it was all a dream. I really had expected more, so much more. Without realizing it, and since enlisting with The Tennessee Zone, I’d come to view The Fed as a beacon of what could be, in addition to being a symbol of the life we’d once lived. People talked about The Fed in whispers, like it was a hidden gem we’d one day be reintroduced to. And now this. How could this be?
“I can see by the look on your face that you’re disappointed. That’s to be expected,” the president said conversationally, like he’d had the same thoughts on a daily basis for the last ten-plus years. “This place, what you all now know of as The Fed, has the capacity to be so much more, do much good. I want you to understand that, Ryker.”
It was the first time he’d used my new name, and it was akin to turning a page in a history book. He was waiting for me to ask, so I did. “What do we do now? How do we go on?”
The president smiled the old familiar grin I’d seen so many times while out on the campaign trail.
“It’s time for you to get reacquainted with someone who will tell you everything you need to know.”
“Who?”
I’d expected him to tell me, not to be passed on to one of the rest of his disappearing staff. Wasn’t the president supposed to be the one with all the answers, the man who somehow shipped food and tech to The Zones and kept those places going?
His answer was the very last thing I ever thought I would hear.
And then he said it, in a voice equal parts reverent and hopeful. “Your father, Ryker. Your father is waiting to speak with you.”
Chapter 30
My father. That was impossible. My father was dead. I saw the building kill him. I saw it. I saw it!
“Ryker?”
I looked up to see the president looking at me expectantly. How long had I been sitting there? No, not sitting. I was standing now, my fists pressed to my sides. I could feel my heartbeat pumping in my temples.
“I don’t understand. My father is dead.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know, son. And, to be fair, he thought you were dead as well.”
He struggled to stand, so much so that I went to help him. He waved my assistance away. Still stubborn.
“I’ll have Scarlett take you to him. He’s waiting.”
I was scared. What would I say to him? What would he say to me? Then it hit me.
“Does he know it’s me?”
The president smiled kindly. “He does now.”
“He didn’t know before?”
A shake of the president’s head, and he pointed up to the ceiling. “He’s seen you by now, but no, he didn’t know before. None of us did.”
That was something. Could it all be coincidence? Knowing my father, it couldn’t be. Was it possible that he’d kept me from the president, had somehow left me to die in The Tennessee Zone only to pluck me out of obscurity as only he could?
“I’m sure he’ll be just as happy as you,” the president urged, motioning to the door. “You don’t want to waste any time. You’ve already lost enough.”
+++
I don’t remember being escorted to see my father. Scarlett walked along quietly, and I followed without seeing.
My father. How could he be alive? It was impossible, wasn’t it?
And then we were standing in front of the last door, my father’s door. It opened and Scarlett left me there. I was totally uncertain about how I should proceed.
“Please come in, son.” It was my father’s voice. “It’s good to see you.”
I walked into the stark white room, almost shielding my eyes from the glare inside. There were no visible shapes inside. Then the lights dimmed and my vision cleared.
It was a circular room, with spokes running outward on the floors and ceiling. In the middle of the room was a glass case that looked like those airtight laboratories the CDC once had. I walked to the glass and rested my hand on it. It was cool and thick. Was my father in quarantine? There was something in the center of the sealed core, but not my father.
“Where are you?” I asked.
My father’s voice came out from the speakers overhead.
“I’m right where you’re looking.”
“But I don’t…”
“Let me explain.” There was my father’s sharpness, when he didn’t like my impetuous attitude, like I was a misfit teen again. The tone flooded me with memories of being berated for trivial mishaps.
I pushed past those memories enough to say, “Then explain.”
“You look good.” His voice was softer now. “How have you been?”
How had I been? Ten years and that was the best thing he could think of to ask?
“How do you think I’ve been? How about you, Dad? Read any good books recently?”
I imagined his pinched lips going white, the vein in his forehead bulging. I waited for the inevitable retort. We were good at that, the back and forth banter of barbs.
“I don’t want to argue, son, really, I don’t.”
I didn’t either. But millions of questions threatened to burst out of me like a blue flame. I took a deep breath and said, “I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
I rested my forehead against the glass and closed my eyes.
“Can you come out so I can see you?” I had an overwhelming urge to look at him again. He was my father, after all, and not many people my age had fathers anymore, not after The Collapse.
“I can’t, son.”
Those three words were like a stab in the heart.
“Why?” I managed to say, the sob in my throat staying where it was for the moment. He was dying. That had to be it. He was being kept alive by one of his machines.
“I’ve…changed.” His voice sounded strained.
“Changed? How?”
I heard him exhale. The speaker system crackled for a second and then went quiet.
“Are you sure you want to know?” he asked.
I wasn’t sure, but I said, “Yes.”
There was a whirring sound, and then the object in the center of the glass room shifted. I thought it was rectangular, but it was a cylinder and half of it was turning. At first I couldn’t see inside, it was just a shadow. Then a light came on in the cylinder and brightened the space. I gasped, gripping the glass for support.
He was right. My father had changed. In fact, he was no longer my father. A single tear ran down my shocked face as I attempted to handle the despair. There was a clear
container suspended inside the cylinder with wires that connected and formed a web, fanning out. The wires continued their path inside the container which looked like it was filled with a vitreous liquid, and entered into what was left of my father, a floating human body, pale but otherwise looking very much alive and well.
Suddenly I recoiled, wanting to be gone from this place. My father was dead.
“Tell me what you’re thinking, son,” my father’s voice asked.
My head shook without my knowing it.
“You’re not my father.”
I was backing away now. I felt like I was choking and I tried to loosen my already open collar.
“Please, let me explain.”
“No, I’m leaving.” I turned and tried to somehow open the door, but it was closed. “Open the door,” I demanded, the panic in my stomach very real now. I had to get out, had to get away.
“I can’t let you leave.” I whirled at the bluntness of his declaration. Whatever he or it was must have recognized my intentions because he was quick to add, “I mean, you can leave if you want, of course, but I need to explain.”
I hesitated, even thinking that maybe I should raise my weapon and shoot through the glass and kill the monster inside. It could work. Then something else unexpected happened. An image flickered to life on the glass partition, blocking my view of the wired body beyond. It was black at first and then shifted to color. It was a picture of my father. No, not a picture. The image was moving. Then he spoke again.
“Is this better?”
“Who are you?” I asked, my entire body tingling with anticipation. I half expected wires to attack me at any moment, like a Venus flytrap, encasing me along with what was supposedly the remains of my own father.
“It’s me, son, I promise. Will you let me explain?”
His face was the same as I remembered. Well, almost the same. It was older, ten years older. Where and how had the time-lapsed image been generated?
