The Core

by Jack Robuck

  Natalie slung her weapon on her shoulder. “Would you rather they shoot at you?”

  “Yes, fuck yes, absolutely.”

  Matthew said, “Look.”

  Behind them stood a vast column of pipes and cables. Conduit and circuitry hung from the ceiling suspended over a fixed point. Looking up, they could see its tiny LED indicators repeating, blinking, the column climbing to a height beyond their sight in the darkness. A similar column rose from deep below, through the cat-walked floor to table height, and the two columns, beveled, converged in a thicket of mechanical arms, intertwined, immobile.

  Several command consoles reached out from the bottom column in arcs around a glass-topped central table like the one from The Waverly. The room was lit only by the foggy grey phosphorescence coming from a large glass cylinder. It sat cockeyed on the center table amongst a pile of books, as if discarded. It had beveled steel ends like spinning tops, and appeared to be filled with a glowing milky liquid.

  Rachel walked over to the cylinder. “What the hell is this?"

  Natalie narrowed her eyes. "Are we at the center of the planet?”

  Jimmy hurried over to one of the terminals, typing, reading. He whistled. “I think we are. How the hell did we travel that far that fast?” He kept reading.

  Matthew walked toward the table, touching the pile of books as if to make sure it was real. "So this place is the Core?"

  Jimmy looked up. “Yes. Yes. This is unbelievable. I knew it. The planet is entirely a construct. A giant machine. It’s not a wasteland; at least it’s not mean to be. It’s broken. It's...stuck, like a record skipping."

  The group exchanged silent glances. Natalie read silently over Jimmy's shoulder. Rachel and Matthew stared up into the blackness above them, and then in unison slowly lowered their heads. Matthew could see his own awed expression mirrored on Rachel's face. Natalie turned away from Jimmy, and looked down at the floor, dazed.

  Jimmy spoke, keeping his eyes on the terminal. “It was meant to orbit the sun, rotating fully on its axis, and it was meant to process solar power, to generate huge amounts of energy through its orbit, and its internal engine. It was meant to power an enormous fleet of ships, thousands of times the size of the one upstairs now.

  “There's an entire terraforming engine here. This planet was never meant to be a prison, or a desert. It’s an incredible factory of life, and technology, and it’s been running itself into a corner over, and over, and over again, for decades.”

  Matthew gazed down into the infinite through the grating, mouth agape. “So what stopped it?”

  Jimmy brought up more data, panning through some pages, searching. “I think it's this. This glass cylinder. Look at this schematic for it: the Chalice. It fits into this space here, between the columns. It’s like a battery and a spark plug in one. It sucks up the energy from the sun, from the planet, and stores it, and redirects it, and feeds it into the whole giant system.”

  Rachel nodded, her eyes narrowed, up-lit in the phosphorescent glow. “We have to put it back in place.”

  Jimmy put both his hands on her shoulders, stopping her in her tracks. “Whoa, hold on, we don't have any idea who took it out, or what happened here.”

  Rachel shrugged him off, circling the Chalice. “My grandfather, maybe he designed this whole planet, maybe he built this whole paradise for everyone, and they destroyed it. No wonder they wanted to stop us from getting down here.”

  Jimmy gripped the edge of the console, leaning toward her. “Rachel, this planet is centuries old. And it didn't exactly seem like they wanted to stop us.”

  Rachel raised a finger to Jimmy's face. “Don't you get it? This is what my grandfather wanted me to do! This is why he taught me the game. He wanted me to fix the world! When we do this...there will be no more drought, no more hunger. We'll be able to live anywhere we want, to plant food. We'll be able to grow stronger and destroy the Fleet. They'll never be able to stop us! This is what my whole life has been about, and I didn't even know it.”

  “Rachel, stop for a minute, and think this through!” Jimmy exclaimed. “If we do this, there's no going back. This will change the planet forever. That hologram of your grandfather didn't say 'Come do this.' He said that if we had to come down here, then he must have failed.”

  “But he did fail! You can't tell me he wanted us to live this way! You've seen the children starving in the streets of the cities, and the Fleet stomping on anyone who gets in their way. We have to do this.”

  Jimmy looked to Matthew, to Natalie, and back to Rachel. “Okay.” He punched in the command. “Take the Chalice, slide the beveled ends into the receivers, and close the latch gate.”

  Trembling, Rachel picked up the white, glowing object and held it in her arms like a baby. She installed it, and stepped back. Jimmy licked his lips, and after a moment, pushed 'Enter.'

  The chalice clicked, and began to spin in its chamber, glowing brightly, filling the room with an unendurable white light. A high pitched whine warbled up into the inaudible, and immediately the enormous steel door began to grind open.

  Pop!

  Pop!

  Pop!

  The strange sound materialized into the sharp rapport of slow, mocking applause. Through the door stepped The Admiral, flanked by the two dozen Sunjumpers, rifles raised.

  The Admiral unwrapped his manufactured grin.

  “Congratulations. You've finally achieved what we've been trying to accomplish for nearly a century. How fitting that the granddaughter of the old bastard who started this mess should finish it for me. I'm thinking very seriously about letting you live out the rest of your years as my personal slave, instead of killing you.”

  The rebels grabbed for their weapons, but the Admiral held up a hand.

  “Ah, ah, ah, my friends. I'd rather not fire inside the Core, unless you make me. You're completely outnumbered, and this is the only way out. It's over.

  “We tried to kill you for years; we didn't even know we needed you. Who knew you'd be able to get past that fucking game? Wonderful.” He spewed up a satisfied smirk. “Back away from the Chalice.”

  The Sunjumpers moved forward with weapons raised. The Admiral crossed his arms. “You're right, you know. This planet, this world...it will thrive now. It will be green, and lush, it will support populations that Earth at its most disgustingly dense could never have fed, let alone allowed to grow strong and healthy. The problem with your theory, however, is that you haven't fully thought this through. 'Who could build an impossibly large planet? What government, what corporation could afford the investment into such a massive undertaking?' The answer, of course, is 'None of them.'

  “It took the full might and influence of the United Fleet to fight past the scheming politicians, through the endless mire of bureaucratic shit. Even when they were told that Earth would be invaded, that an alien assault force was en route, that they would arrive in a matter of centuries, still the idiots wallowed in political brinksmanship. This was the only way.

  “You don't understand that do you? You're just fighting against the big bad man in the sky. Rebels. Planetsiders. Hah!”

  The Admiral's cold eyes fell on Matthew's raised rifle. “What about you, boy? You're from The Waverly, aren't you? You know that what the Fleet does, it does for the good of all...not for the momentary glow of approval from some howling democracy. The Fleet built this planet. We built it for a purpose. It's ours.”

  Matthew glared at him in silence, but inside his head it was like he was seeing and hearing everything from the bottom of a well. How much is there that the rebels don't know?

  The Admiral turned on the gantry, and beckoned behind him. From the hallway stepped the elderly Commander Cullen of The Waverly. “Tell them, Commander. Tell this bitch that her grandfather, her whole family, and every single member of her pathetic little army have the blood of the entire Earth on their hands.”

  Commander Cullen shuffled forward, still wounded from the fight on the bridge. “It’s true
. Matthew Allen...I never knew you on the ship, and I'm sorry for that. So many people are gone. But you have to listen to me now.

  “This planet...its whole purpose was to build a defense force for the Earth...with ships and soldiers that would outnumber the greatest capacities of the invaders...and these people...they were scientists, engineers...they mutinied. They broke this planet by locking it in a state of constant reset. They let the Earth be wiped of human life and conquered by invaders over some petty squabble. All that time we spent on our way here...we never knew.”

  The Admiral leered at Rachel. “All the things you've accused me of, I have done. The slave labor in the refineries just to keep my ships in the sky. The allocation of food, water, land and resources to the Fleet, for the Fleet, yes. Yes, the hunting down, and murder of your rebel friends, I have done it. We have done terrible things. And every single one of them, your grandfather drove us to. If we had not, the Fleet would be gone. And in another hundred years, another two or three when the invaders came here, they would have found your pitiful wasteland society completely incapable of defending itself.” The Admiral turned to Matthew.

  “You see this, don't you boy? After all this time, we will have in our power the full operating capacity of this magnificent planet.” The Admiral, inspired, shouted through his gritted teeth. “Already, the energy of the sun is being channeled, funneled up to the Fleet, and all of my ships that have sat dormant for a generation will get this planet back on schedule!”

  Commander Cullen held out his hand to Matthew. “I can get you out of this. Richard Glazier, too. You can both come back where you belong. The colonists that survived The Waverly will be part of the first generation to rebuild this planet. The Admiral has promised...”

  Rachel held up her hands. “Enough! Don't listen to this coward's lies. Or his truths. It doesn't matter. And we'll never know the truth anyway. All that matters is that whatever they're doing, they fail.” She pointed her assault rifle, one handed, toward the glowing, spinning Chalice.

  Matthew spun on his heel. “Rachel, what the fuck?”

  She smiled at him, keeping one eye on the Admiral, her finger on the trigger. “Listen, cowboy. He's right. If this thing powers up the Fleet, they'll have the jump on us, and nothing will change. The Core; the planet...it’s just like The Waverly, I see that now. Too much power for this corrupt, evil bastard to control. And if we can't control it...”

  Matthew turned to face her completely, The Admiral and the Commander standing just steps behind him. “The Fleet doesn't have to be evil, Rachel.”

  “It doesn't have to be. But it is.”

  "There's a plan. We didn't know that. There's a reason. We're talking about survival, isn't that worth it?"

  Rachel smiled. "Cowboy, survival ain't worth nothing."

  Matthew swallowed. He raised the barrel of his assault rifle to Rachel's chest. Jimmy and Natalie quickly pointed their rifles at Matthew.

  Jimmy stepped out from behind Rachel to clear his shot. “What the fuck, kid?”

  Natalie was aiming wildly, covering the Fleet and Matthew. She spoke quietly to Rachel. “We gotta get out of here. We can fight this shit another day.”

  Rachel looked calmly into Matthew's eyes. “No. The Admiral's right, this fight is already over. The only thing we can do here is give Matthew a chance to pick a side. We need to be here for Matthew for a moment. We have to give him time.”

  The Admiral stepped forward behind Matthew, placing his hand on his shoulder. “I'm growing tired of this. You can all surrender, this instant, or you will be destroyed.”

  Rachel looked calmly into Matthew's eyes. The cold white light of the chalice lit up half her face, reminding Matthew of how she sat sleeping as they pulled into the station. “Cowboy.”

  “Stop it, Rachel.”

  “Matthew. I'm not trying to manipulate you. In the end, it doesn't matter. But you know how we've lived here. You've tasted freedom. I don't know what it was like on that ship of yours, but it isn't like that here. With us, or with them. It’s all over now, the last thing that has to happen is your decision. Of who you want to be.”

  “You mean we're dead either way.”

  “Yes. Either dead, or worse. So what's it going to be? Do I blow the Chalice and stop the Admiral? Or are you gonna kill me?”

  Matthew took his left hand off the assault rifle, keeping it pointed at her chest with his right. “Don't blow the Chalice.”

  The Admiral's grip tightened on Matthew's shoulder. “Hah! I'll make an officer of you boy.”

  Matthew's hand felt sweaty on the stippled grip of the rifle. The white light cast Rachel a bloodless, angry temptress, but her adrenaline shocked eyes were flecked green like the mosses of Luna, and he slipped away for a moment into the steamy hush of the balcony of the Silver Lady.

  His hand drifted down toward his holster, under his jacket. He pulled out his revolver, hidden in front of his torso, and turned it back toward the Admiral inch by inch. Matthew stared straight ahead. “There's another way, Rachel.”

  Her eyes glimmered slightly. “You're right. You're right.”

  In one swift movement her hand opened, her rifle dropped away, and her fingers ripped the pins on two grenades in her assault vest. She grabbed Matthew's rifle and his left shoulder, twisting him forward and away from the Admiral, and flinging him to the grating.

  Taking three quick steps, she wrapped the Admiral in a vice-like bear hug, and tackled him into the Troopers. He struggled to get away, backing into the center of the tightly packed group. The Sunjumpers were turning, and firing. A shot ripped through Rachel's torso, and two more went through the Admiral, as the panicked soldiers joined fire before the grenades went off, obliterating Rachel, the Admiral, and a dozen Troopers around them.

  Jimmy and Natalie opened fire quickly, executing disoriented Troopers. Jimmy grabbed Matthew by the collar unceremoniously, and dragged him toward the door. Natalie took a shot in the lower torso, near her hip, but she kept firing, limping forward. Jimmy's assault vest thudded with two shots, then suddenly they were in the hallway, limping, running.

  Jimmy held off their pursuers as Natalie pulled Matthew to his feet. “Can you walk, you little shit? You hit anywhere?”

  Matthew's ears were ringing. He turned to the wall and threw up.

  “No, fuck that, where's your rifle? No? Fine. Pull out your revolver. Stand the fuck up. Good. Jimmy? Let's goooooo!”

  The trio retreated through cover positions down the long white hallway to the lift shaft entrance. They exchanged fire with two Troopers who had managed to focus in the aftermath and give chase, but they were soon aboard the glass lift zipping up to the surface.

  *

  Across the frozen, blocky shapes of a thousand mud-grey hulls dawned a silent click. A hundred thousand ports, a hundred thousand scrubbers chop-chop-chopped up to a blurry spin from a century of stasis. Hovering over the equator of the bright side of the planet, the tattered Fleet had gathered, desiccated, fetal. Now, from below, the invisible stream, the lifeblood of the Fleet, spurted from the portals, the titanic machines rising from cracks newly formed on the planet's surface. Sand poured like waterfalls into these crevices as telescoping towers larger than cities unfurled, spewing beams of energy to nurture the ships far above.

  From within the planet poured another nectar too: clean water gushed, flooding vast badlands. Steam vents screeched shredding bellows, lightning rippled through gathering clouds, and the people everywhere cowered for the end. The vast terraforming engine of the impossible planet kicked into cycle. Rivers rushed through towns, launch-release drones seeded the moistened soil of plains larger than planets.

  Slowly, the great orbit slowed. It sighed to a halt. It turned, and kept turning, and kept turning, and for the first time in a century, the sun's rays swept broad, dusting away the darkness.

  Chapter 11

  Cozy in her nest of blankets, Ella pulled her shoulders up high, almost to her ears, and shimmied, shaking off the
cobwebs of a long sleep. She liked to wake up slowly, perhaps over a period of an hour, and she wasn't at all surprised to wake to find one foot out from under the covers, already hooked over the concrete ledge of her sleeping nook and flat on the floor.

  She smiled to herself, at herself, and twisted, one arm over her face to block out the light.

  Light?

  Her eyes blossomed into suspicious slits, her lashes unlacing like a carnivorous plant. Was it possible the rain had stopped? Ella sat straight up in bed, her arms barely quick enough to catch her from falling right over again.

  The Light. The sun. She squinted out at the sky. Not black, not even stormy, like when low rain clouds overhead reflected Luna's greens and blues back at her. This was blue. A deep, dark, incredible blue like the dream of a moment after a lightning strike, that brilliant, bright light that you can never really take in.

  Ella shivered and wrapped the blankets around her shoulders. Turning, she pulled her feet up and hugged her knees, leaning back against the wall of her nook, and watched the beautiful square window grow brighter, through cerulean and cyan (All the good 'C' blues, she thought, and smiled).

  In the distance on a high up balcony, a window sash hinged out like a shutter. Flapping in the breeze, it came on like a light bulb, reflecting, glowing silver to gold, to gold, and a single ray of light shot from it right into her eyes, and she turned away quickly, and giggled.

  The ceiling veined, crawling with light reflected from water somewhere. "Why today?" she said aloud.

  For the first time in time unknown, the ambers of day washed across Luna, the reds, and the yellows, and even—she rushed to the window and leaned out, glowing—the browns, all the warmth of life.

  Ella dressed, glancing at her candles on the table, on the shelves inset in the wall. The incredible blackness of their burnt wicks. The color was overwhelming.

  How funny, in the city of night, that black is truly black in the light of day much more than at night.