Eden Rising

by Brett Battles

“So was Dennis right, then?” Rachel said. “Is it a phone number?”

  Leon brought up a list of country codes. The number he’d written down started with 881, but the only codes on the list that began with 88 were 880 for Bangladesh and 886 for Taiwan.

  “No 881,” he said.

  “Maybe you wrote it down wrong,” Paul suggested.

  Leon looked at him, annoyed. “Neither zero nor six sounds anything like one.”

  “Yeah, but there’s a lot of interference,” Dennis countered.

  “Be my guest, then.” Leon brought up the phone application on his screen and held out his headset.

  “I’m just trying to look at all the angles,” Dennis told him without taking it from him.

  “We should at least try, don’t you think?” Rachel said. “Leon, give it a go.”

  Leon didn’t exactly scoff as he put the headset back on, but he came close. He dialed the number using the 880 Bangladesh prefix. It took only a couple of seconds before a series of tones came out of the speakers. These were followed by a message informing them in heavily accented English that no such number existed.

  He tried 886 next. This time there was a delay of several seconds, but the number turned out to be another dead end.

  Crystal’s terminal began emitting a soft bong-bong-bong. She checked her screen. “It’s Matt,” she said as she donned her headset and clicked the ACCEPT button. “Hey, Matt. It’s Crystal…she’s right here. Hold on.”

  She gave her headset to Rachel.

  “Are you back on the road?” Rachel asked her brother when the headset was in place.

  “Not yet,” Matt replied. His voice sounded as tired as hers must have sounded to him. “Had a little incident last night.”

  “What kind of incident?”

  He gave her a quick rundown of what had happened.

  When he finished, she asked, “Is Chloe going to be all right?”

  “Just a few bruised ribs and a sprained wrist. Physically, she’ll be fine.”

  “Physically?”

  He hesitated a moment before replying. “Something happened to her while she was up there. I don’t know how, but I think she’s starting to remember.”

  Rachel almost asked, “Remember what?” when she realized what he meant. “You’ve told me yourself that’s not possible.”

  “We don’t know that for sure.”

  My God, Rachel thought.

  She caught sight of Leon and the others. They all had their eyes on her, no doubt trying to figure out what Matt had said. “Hold on,” she said into the mic, then put her hand over it. “Can you guys give me the room for a moment?”

  Crystal looked at her terminal, obviously not comfortable with the thought of being away from it.

  “If a message comes in, I’ll come get you,” Rachel assured her.

  “Okay,” Crystal said. “Sure.”

  “No problem,” Dennis said.

  Leon stood up. “If you need us, we’ll be right outside.”

  “Thanks,” Rachel said. “Shut the door on the way out.”

  Leon looked disappointed, but he nodded and followed the others out.

  Once alone, she said, “So what has she remembered?”

  “Nothing definite. It’s, well, the girl we found last night—she’s about Brandon’s age. Her name’s Ginny. I think that might have triggered something.”

  Though Ginny was not Jeannie, the name was very close, and if the girl was Brandon’s age…

  Oh, Lord.

  “What did she actually say?” Rachel asked.

  “Nothing, really. It’s more that she knows there’s something there to remember.” He paused. “I’m sure it’s going to be fine. I’ll keep a closer eye on her.”

  “My God, Matt. If she remembers, and starts to ask questions—”

  “We’ll deal with that if that happens.”

  “You need to keep me informed.”

  “I will, but like I said, it’s going to be all right,” he said. “Tell me where we are with the interventions.”

  She gave herself a moment to lock away her concerns about Chloe, and then said, “We’ve identified seven more groups overnight. And have told them we’ll bring them vaccine, so most have agreed to stay where they are for at least another twenty-four hours.”

  “Can we get people to all of them in that time?”

  “We think so. It’ll be tight. One of the groups is in Nova Scotia. They’re really itching to get over to the survival station in Montreal. I have a plane that can get to them after a stop in Pennsylvania, but I’m concerned the Nova Scotia group won’t stick around.” She paused. “Matt, people are really buying into the whole UN angle. A couple times we’ve even had to pretend we’re with the UN, too. I don’t like lying like that. Could be a problem for us later.”

  “If that’s what it takes, then it’s a problem we can live with,” Matt said. “Have you heard anything from Tamara and Bobby?”

  “She checked in yesterday,” Rachel said.

  “And?”

  “They found the NSA monitoring facility.”

  “Thank God. Can they pull it off there?”

  “Tamara says Bobby thinks so. He’s got some of the equipment running, but he’s having problems with the uplinks.”

  “He’s got to get it working, and it needs to happen now.”

  “I know how important it is. They know how important. They’re doing everything they can.”

  “I realize that, but it’s….Listen, tell them the minute they’re ready to go, they shouldn’t wait for the okay from us. Just do it.”

  “All right. I’ll tell them,” she said. “How long until you get here?”

  “The storm has really messed things up. We were able to tap into a NOAA satellite a little while ago. We’re not getting hit too hard here anymore, but it’s still pounding the Rockies and continuing to head south. I’m thinking we’re going to need to dip down into New Mexico to get across, and it’ll probably still be pretty slow going even then. If we can get to Nevada in three days, it’ll be a miracle.”

  Rachel frowned. “Don’t lie to me, Matt. I know what you’re thinking.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “New Mexico?”

  “Don’t know if you’ve looked at any satellite images, but that storm’s pretty bad.”

  “I know the storm is bad, but you’d be heading for New Mexico anyway, wouldn’t you? That’s why you want Tamara and Bobby to hurry up. You need their distraction.”

  In the silence that followed, she knew he was regretting showing her the message from C8.

  “Matt, it’s too dangerous. You don’t have a large enough team. Besides, we haven’t done the necessary recon.”

  “I’ve been there before,” he said.

  “A long time ago.”

  “And nothing will have changed since then,” he said.

  “Except that they won’t be welcoming you at the door.”

  “You never know,” he said, trying to make a joke.

  “If you have to go through New Mexico, you damn well better stay to the north. Albuquerque straight into Arizona. Las Cruces is off limits.”

  “You’ve seen the message, Rachel. He’s there. NB219. Cut off the head and the body dies.”

  “Bullshit. It didn’t work at Bluebird. Why would it work now?”

  “Because of what happened at Bluebird. They’re already weakened. If they lose their second leader in a few weeks, it will rip them apart.”

  “Can you even imagine how much security he’ll have in place?” she argued.

  “Less than you think. In his mind, who’s going to come after him?”

  “Us.”

  “He doesn’t even know who we are.”

  “He knows exactly who you are,” she countered.

  “That’s not what I meant, and you know it. And as far as anyone at Project Eden is concerned, I’m buried in the past. Rachel, don’t you see it? This could very well be the only chance we w
ill ever get. They’ve pulled off their eradication plan; there’s nothing we can do about that. What we can do is stop them from being the ones who benefit from it. Someone is going to have to lead the human race into this new age, but I’ll burn in hell before I let it be any of them. Right now, they’re still decentralized. It won’t be long before this new principal director and his puppet directorate are buried beneath layers and layers of protection. We have to take advantage of this situation and you know it.”

  As much as she wanted to argue that point, she couldn’t.

  “Have you told the others?” she asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “They might not be happy you kept it from them.”

  “I’ll deal with it.”

  She rubbed a hand across her forehead, her eyes closed. “If you do this, you can’t fail,” she whispered.

  “I have no intention of failing.”

  “That’s not the same thing.”

  “I won’t fail. Better?”

  It wasn’t.

  __________

  WHILE THEY WAITED in the hallway that connected the comm room with the rest of the base, Leon, Crystal, Dennis, and Paul couldn’t help but speculate on what Rachel and Matt were talking about. But any attempt to find out came to an abrupt halt the moment the door flew open, and Rachel, her face strained, strode out.

  “How’s Chloe?” Leon asked.

  Rachel looked at them as if she hadn’t expected them to be there. “Chloe? Um, she fell off a roof, but she’ll be okay.”

  “How did that happen?” Dennis asked.

  Rachel started walking away again, but went only a few feet before she turned back. “Have we heard from Tamara and Bobby this morning? Have they made any progress?”

  The others all looked at Paul. He was the one who’d last spoken to the former PCN reporter and her cameraman.

  “No contact yet today,” Paul said.

  “I need to talk to them as soon as possible.”

  “Uh, sure. I’ll see what I can do.”

  Rachel walked off without another word.

  “Now I really want to know what’s going on,” Leon whispered to Crystal as they filed back into the room.

  Returning to their respective desks, they got back to work. For Leon, that meant trying to tease out what the series of numbers he’d written down from the radio message meant. Not coordinates. Not a phone number. A web address?

  Though the Internet had become spotty, with many websites unreachable as servers began to malfunction, other sites still worked exactly as they had been designed to do. He typed the number into his browser and hit ENTER.

  WEB ADDRESS UNKNOWN

  Not a web address, then. At least not one that worked anymore.

  Taking the shotgun approach next, he pasted the number in the box of a still functioning search engine, and clicked. He was presented with a long list of links, but none were direct hits.

  He was running out of ideas fast, and was tempted to consider it a dead end. But someone out there had broadcast it, someone who was still alive. He had to exhaust every possibility.

  That’s when he realized he had never dialed the exact number he’d written it down, but only tried alternate country codes. Given that there was no 881, he was sure he’d experience the same failure as earlier, but in the interest of being thorough, he had to make the attempt.

  He punched the numbers into his phone app.

  No series of tones. No call failed message.

  A ring.

  He slapped Crystal on the arm.

  “Hey! Watch it!” she said.

  He turned on the external speakers just in time to catch the third ring.

  “Who are you calling?” she asked.

  “The number,” he said, holding up the piece of paper.

  “But it didn’t work.”

  “I didn’t try it exactly like—”

  “Hailo?” A man’s voice, tentative and surprised.

  “Hello?” Leon said. “Can you hear me?”

  “Yes. Can.”

  The person on the other end sounded older, with an accent Leon couldn’t place yet.

  “Were you broadcasting your phone number on the radio?”

  “Yes! Yes! Radio. Number. Thank you, call.”

  “You’re welcome. My name is Leon. Who are you?”

  “Wait. Wait.”

  There was movement over the line, and then nothing.

  “Hello?” Leon said. “Hello?”

  “Are you still connected?” Crystal asked.

  According to the computer, he was. He tapped the button that would record the call, something he should have done right away, and said to Crystal, “Go get Rachel back here. She’ll want to hear this.”

  Crystal clearly didn’t want to leave.

  “She can’t have gone far,” Leon said. “Go and come right back. You won’t miss much.”

  She rose with reluctance and headed out the door.

  “Hello?” Leon said into his mic.

  Still nothing from the other end. He double-checked to make sure his mute function wasn’t on, and that the line was truly still connected, and everything was as it should be.

  The sound started out so soft he wasn’t sure he heard anything, but as it grew louder and louder, he realized he was hearing steps.

  “Hello?” a new voice said. A woman this time, younger.

  “Hello. My name is Leon. Who am I speaking to?”

  “I am Jabala.” She sounded excited. “So good to hear you.”

  “Good to hear you, too, Jabala. Where are you?”

  “The St. William Boarding School.”

  “Where exactly is that?”

  “I am sorry. I do not know the name of the town.”

  “Well, where is it near?”

  “Oh, um, it is a few hours away from Mumbai.”

  “Mumbai? Mumbai, India?”

  “Yes. India. Where are you? Are you close? Are there others with you?”

  He pulled up the list of country codes again. India was 91, not 881. “No, no. I’m in, uh, the US. And not alone.”

  “I am so happy to hear that.”

  “How many are with you?”

  “There are thirty-two of us now.”

  He pulled up the protocol sheet for first contact so he wouldn’t miss anything. The first question always made him pause. “Uh, how many of you are, um, sick?”

  “Sick? You mean with the flu?”

  “Yes.”

  “No one. How many of you are sick?”

  He knew from experience gained over the last several days that some survivor groups had at least a few people starting to show signs of the disease, so he was relieved to hear Jabala’s people were untouched. Still, she could have been hiding the truth. “We’re okay here, too.” Wanting to probe a bit further, he asked, “You’ve been able to avoid contact with anyone ill?”

  “For the most part, yes. But we are safe. We have been vaccinated.”

  Leon could feel his chest contract. Vaccinated? Was this St. William Boarding School one of Project Eden’s survival stations?

  “Where exactly are you?” he asked.

  “What do you mean? I have already told you.”

  “Tell me, Jabala, when did you receive the vaccine from the UN?” In his mind, he was already starting to write them off as future Sage Flu victims.

  “The UN?” she said. “We did not receive the vaccine from the UN.”

  That stopped him for a moment. “Then who gave it to you?”

  “My sister’s husband, Sanjay. He stole it for us.”

  Leon’s tension eased a bit. This Sanjay had probably gotten his hands on some kind of home remedy, or perhaps some antibiotics from a hospital. Neither would be effective against the virus, but they also wouldn’t be as deadly as Project Eden’s “vaccine.”

  “Maybe I should speak to Sanjay,” he said.

  “He is not here now.”

  “Okay, maybe I can talk to him later, but you need t
o listen to me very carefully. The people who are claiming to be from the UN are lying. They are not here to help anyone.” Behind him, he heard Crystal enter the room. He glanced back and was surprised to see she was alone. “You need to stay away from them. In fact, you should stay away from Mumbai completely. It’s not safe.”

  “We already know this,” Jabala said.

  Again, her response caught him off guard. “What do you mean, you already know?”

  “Sanjay. He told us the same thing. It is why he and Kusum went to the city. To find out for sure.”

  “He and…Kusum are in the city?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s very dangerous. They could get—”

  “They are very careful. They know what they are doing.”

  Maybe, maybe not, but there wasn’t much Leon could do to help them at the moment. “What made Sanjay think they were lying?”

  “The UN people are using the same location as the company that spread the disease through our city,” she began.

  When she finished telling him about Pishon Chem and the “miracle mosquito spray” Sanjay and others had been hired to douse the city with, Leon realized that maybe the vaccine Jabala’s brother-in-law had given everyone was the real thing after all.

  “I definitely need to talk to Sanjay as soon as he comes back.”

  “I could send someone to bring him back.”

  “No!” he said quickly. “You shouldn’t send anyone else to the city. It’s too dangerous. The most important thing you can do right now is to stay alive, and that means you and your people should stay where you are. Do you understand?”

  “Of course. Staying alive is what we are doing already.”

  “We’re happy to count you among our new friends, Jabala. We can definitely help each other.” Leon gave her a number that would connect her directly to the comm center. “Call that number anytime you want to talk to us. Someone will always be here to answer. And I’ll definitely check back with you later.”

  “Okay. Thank you, Leon. It is good to have you as a new friend, too. Good-bye.”

  “Good-bye, Jabala.”

  Leon disconnected the call. After staring at his keyboard for a second, he looked over at Crystal, eyes wide.

  “What?” she asked.

  STATE OF MAHARASHTRA, INDIA

  9:51 PM IST

  JEEVAL WHIMPERED, WANTING to be lifted up, as Jabala set down the satellite phone.