“Oh bloody hell, we will,” Harland said. “I am not a little schoolgirl who needs your help to cross the road.”
“Harland please shut up, this isn’t about you, or your pride,” Nanook said. “Afon has stopped up ahead, because he’s found a spot for us to take our shot at Mortterra, and we need to be able to get to Afon’s side, without drawing attention to him. If you go flying off without full control of your jump, you’ll be spotted. It’s nothing personal, Harland; we were all new once. You’ll get the hang of it, but today is not a day that we can afford to practice. Do you understand?”
Harland nodded, but remained silent. Like a child with wounded feelings, sometimes Harland was so overcome with self-pity that he couldn’t speak, for fear that he would cry.
“Are you ready, Harland?”
Again, Harland nodded his assent, but did not speak.
Nanook took Harland’s hand and said, “Now, you’re going to hold on tight, and follow my lead, okay? When we land, you have got to stay absolutely silent, Harland. The position that Afon is in, right at the edge of the forest, is just beyond sight of the AmEur Alliance guards; beyond eyesight, but not earshot. Land gently, in lockstep with me, and keep your mouth shut.”
Harland nodded, but wouldn’t look Nanook in they eye.
“Lockstep – with me – understand?” Nanook said, and Harland met his eyes, gulped, and nodded.
Harland and Nanook crouched in unison, pushed off from the ground, and soared over the tops of the trees.
TWENTY FOUR
Nanook and Harland straightened their legs, in unison, and pointed their toes down to begin their descent. They landed quietly on a patch of soft moss that Nanook had spotted from the air.
Afon was crouched down, and had his eyes steadily locked on a place about a thousand yards away. He turned when he heard Nanook and Harland come up behind him.
“Quiet now boys,” Afon whispered, “don’t want to spook the deer.”
Nanook shook his head at the sight of Afon done up in full hunting regalia. He was covered, head to toe, in mud, and had stuck dried leaves and twigs to himself as camouflage.
“You can mock my appearance all you want Nanook, but if you don’t want to be seen, I would highly suggest that you and Harland lie down here with me,” Afon said, and gestured to the cleared forest floor next to him.
“Okay brother, relax, I’m in,” Nanook said, and crouched down on the ground.
“Oh, how exciting! An encampment,” Harland said, and lied down on the ground as well.
Nanook looked at Afon and rolled his eyes, sharing a moment’s amusement at Harland’s expense. This was not a jolly picnic that they were on.
“Have you seen him yet?” Nanook said. “I figured, since you’d come to a stop, that you had eyes on the tyrant.”
“I haven’t seen Mortterra yet,” Afon said, “but look who I did find.”
He gestured past the trees, and Harland and Nanook’s eyes followed.
A barbed wire fence enclosed all of Thule Airbase, but through the metal fencing a five man patrol was visible, executing a drill in perfect formation. Walking aside the patrol, clearly in command of it, was a tall, lanky, young, blond Captain of the AmEur Alliance.
“Fyodor!” Nanook said. “How is he even alive? I can’t believe that Mortterra has allowed Isi’s brother to live, much less left him in command of a unit.”
“Isi’s brother? The Countess has a brother, here in the future?” Harland said.
“Yes, he’s the tall one conducting the drill over there,” Afon said. “Perfect form, the boy is coming along well. His name is Fyodor Nizienko, and you’ll be meeting him soon.”
“I will?” Harland said.
“He will?” Nanook said. “Surely, you don’t intend us to … No, Afon. We can’t involve Fyodor in this. Isi would never forgive you if something went wrong.”
“What Isi will never forgive, is failure,” Afon said. “She’s made very clear what her priorities are: love, honor, and loyalty, rank far below survival to her. And not just individual survival – we’re all expendable to her, every human on this planet, as long as the planet lives, that’s all Isi cares about.”
“But we’re talking about her little brother,” Nanook said. “There’s a reason that Isi didn’t take him with us, a reason she didn’t involve him as much in our plans as she could have, she wants Fyodor to stay safe. It would be the greatest of betrayals for you to come here and put him in harms way, Afon.”
“The only reason we’re all here, the real reason Isi agreed that the assassination of Ignis Mortterra was necessary, was for the protection of Fyodor. Once Isi realized that George Murphy was being tortured to get him to produce those monsters that Mortterra sent after us, she knew that Fyodor would be next. Only then did she agree that Mortterra needed to die. But she doesn’t really care if Fyodor lives, she just doesn’t want him to be tortured. If she wanted him to live, she wouldn’t have left him here. She knows the food is running out, and this place …” Afon said, gesturing to the airbase around them, “this place has a year left, at best. If she wanted him to live, she would have taken Fyodor with us. Isi may not have told us to enlist her brother on this mission, but I am sure that’s what she meant for us to do.”
Nanook sighed, “Okay Afon, perhaps you are right; you know Isi the best, obviously. I just hope your judgment hasn’t become clouded by your current anger toward her. She doesn’t mean to hurt you, brother.”
“Just as I do not mean to hurt her by involving Fyodor in our plan, it’s just what needs to happen. He can help us get access to places, help us to get closer to Mortterra than we could on our own. And there’s really no way that we can come here, see Isi’s brother, and not try to take him back to her, with us, to Detroit,” Afon said, and looked at Nanook. “If you disagree, I won’t do it brother. Maybe you’re right, and if I’m not making a clear headed decision, I shouldn’t be the one to decide this.”
“No, I think you’re right Afon,” Nanook said. “There’s no way that we can go back to Isi and tell her that we saw him, but didn’t rescue him.”
“I agree too, not that any of you have asked,” Harland said. “We must save the brother of the Countess, and if we’re in for a penny, we’re in for a pound. If we’ve got to break the lad out of here, we might as well enlist his help with the bloodier matters that we have to attend to. He’s a soldier, after all, and I dare say that he’d be a better shot than any of us.”
Nanook and Afon exchange a knowing look – Afon had been a soldier too, once. He had served in an elite unit, Mortterra’s own version of a Praetorian guard, for six years before he signed up for Project Immortality.
Fyodor had been only a boy of eight when the waters rose, in the year 2100. Afon had grown up in the same village in Russia, and had gone to school with Isi, from Kindergarten to the end of high school. They had been childhood sweethearts, and it had been the most natural thing in the world for Afon to leave the Russian Army base, where he was stationed, and return to their village to rescue Isi and Fyodor, when the world-ending storms had begun in 2100. After he managed to link back up with the remnants of the Russian Army, Afon had secured Isi, Fyodor, and himself, spots on the ark-like super vessel that Mortterra had commandeered during the collapse of the American government. Mortterra had recruited anyone with military experience onto the ark, and into the AmEur Alliance that he was forming, Afon included.
But that was a story for another time. Harland had no need to know that Fyodor had only become a soldier because, as a boy, he had wanted nothing more than to grow up to be just like Afon.
“So, we are all in agreement,” Afon said. “We now need to find a way to communicate with Fyodor, and split him off from his unit.”
Afon, Nanook, and Harland all stared off into the distance. Lying down, resting their weight on their elbows, their eyes all scanned the fenced area, looking at the physical layout of the base, but also taking a moment of silence together to allow inspir
ation a quiet space from which to emerge.
“You know boys, I do think that this is a situation that calls for a strategy of diversion,” Harland said. “If we can find a way to distract the troops with Fyodor, we might be able to spirit the lad away from them. Then we could all discuss how to get close enough to kill Mortterra. Seems to me, we should include the young man in our discussions – his knowledge of Mortterra’s routines could prove invaluable, I’d think.”
Afon nodded. “Very true, Harland, good work. Now, how do we distract the other troops, without showing our hand? If Nanook and I are recognized, or if Fyodor’s disappearance is questioned, the base will go on high alert, and we’ll have almost no chance of getting to Mortterra.”
“They wouldn’t recognize Harland,” Nanook said.
“And what of it?” Harland said. “Do you fellows suggest that I just walk up to the guards, and ask for a minute of their young Captain’s time?”
“Actually …” Afon said, “that just might be exactly what you should do. Listen, we used to have citizens show up at the airbase perimeter, all the time, begging for food, or asking for more time on grid. Each household in the AmEur Alliance is given a ration: enough rice and beans for one meal a day, and two days a week with electrical power. So, some people come to the fence to beg, others to bribe. The right amount, to the right soldier, can get you an extra day of light, or a bit more on your plate. The beggars will ask any soldier that they can get to make eye contact with them, but the bribers – the bribers always ask to speak to the officer in charge.”
“Which, in this case, is Fyodor,” Nanook said. “Alright, that could work.”
“Excuse me gentlemen,” Harland said, “are you really proposing that I just saunter up there, and ask to speak to Fyodor? You’re all absolutely mad; I would be shot before the first word was out of my mouth.”
“No one is going to shoot you brother,” Afon said. “Mortterra doesn’t like to show a heavy hand in public. If you were truly in danger, you’d be alone with him. The AmEur Alliance guards are just men, like us, doing a job in order to survive. They won’t shoot you, unless someone tells them to, and no one will tell them to. Just make sure that your first words to Fyodor are, ‘Isi sent me’, and you’ll be fine.”
“I’m really not sure that I’m comfortable with this chaps,” Harland said. “Why don’t we brainstorm on this one, a bit more? There’s got to be an alternative.”
“Sorry Harland,” Nanook said, “this is the most discrete option, and really the best one. Remember what we were talking about before … Isi’s unique qualities?”
Harland nodded.
“Well, we came back to London to find you, because Isi told us to, told us that we would need your help, after we had all decided to assassinate Ignis Mortterra. I think that she knew then that we would come to this point, and that we would need you in order to move forward. This is what you are supposed to do, Harland.”
TWENTY FIVE
“Isi sent me,” Harland said through the fence, to Isi’s shocked baby brother.
Fyodor glanced around quickly, to assure himself that none of his troops were within earshot.
“Who are you? How do you know my sister?”
“I am Harland Fergusson, and I met your sister on her travels. I gather that you know she has gone into the past to try to stop all of this dreadfulness that’s been done to our Earth?”
Fyodor nodded.
“Well, she has sent Afon, Nanook, and I here to …” Harland said.
“Afon is here? Where?” Fyodor said, loudly enough that some of the guards turned their way. Fyodor held his hand up to them and indicated that everything was fine.
“We’ve got to make this quick,” Fyodor said. “We are starting to look suspicious. You have to take me to Afon; I must speak with him directly. Meet me here, in this exact spot, in six hours, at twenty one hundred, just after nightfall. We’ll go to see Afon and Nanook together, okay?”
Harland nodded.
“Get back from here, you useless bum,” Fyodor said, his voice rising so his soldiers could hear him. “We’ve got no charity for you today. Go on, get out of here!”
Harland turned, deliberately slouched his shoulders, and shuffled away. The guards near Fyodor watched the retreating figure of the bum for a few minutes, until they were satisfied that there was nothing dangerous about him.
TWENTY SIX
At nine o’clock that evening, Fyodor met Harland at the fence. They walked silently across the open field surrounding the airbase, until they reached the tree line, where Afon and Nanook were waiting.
Afon wrapped his arms around Fyodor, and lifted him from the ground.
“How are you, my brother,” Afon said, and squeezed Fyodor on the shoulder.
“I am good Afon, good enough, at least. These months since you’ve been gone haven’t been easy …” Fyodor trailed off. “Have you heard about George Murphy?”
“We haven’t heard anything, but we suspected,” Afon said. “It’s a miracle that you’re still alive.”
“Not a miracle at all,” Fyodor said and laughed. “Just following my sister’s orders, as usual.”
“What do you mean Fyodor?” Afon said. “What were Isi’s instructions to you?”
“Before you all left, Isi discussed her plan, with me, to help you two avoid execution,” Fyodor said, and gestured at Afon and Nanook. “She told me that, after all of you had left, I was to tell Mortterra that I knew nothing. She wouldn’t even tell me where you all were going, so if Mortterra tortured me, there’d be no information for him to get. I wanted to go with you Afon, but Isi told me to wait here.”
“She told you to wait for what?” Afon said.
“She told me that I should stay here and wait for you – that you would come back for me, and that it was critical that I remain alive, and regain Mortterra’s trust, in the meantime,” Fyodor said. “She told me that I would need to help you do something, and that it would be the most important thing that I would ever do. I don’t really understand, but I have done all that Isi asked, and here you are.”
“I understand,” Nanook said, and glanced at Harland meaningfully. “Isi just has a way of knowing things, sometimes.”
Harland gasped. “The Countess knew of these events, months in advance? How magnificent! Do you think that she planned on me being here, as well, Nanook? And, Fyodor, did she say anything to you about me?”
Fyodor nodded, “She did tell me to listen for the plea of a stranger who would speak her name to me – and to follow him.”
Fyodor looked down at his feet, took off his Captain’s hat, and ran his fingers through his short blond hair.
“Isi has always known things, I guess, even when she was younger. If a storm was coming, and she was babysitting me, she’d somehow know that the rain was about to start, and she’d get me inside without making a big deal of it. On my tenth birthday, just days before the storms that changed the world, Isi had come home for the weekend and brought a bicycle with her; my first ten speed that I’d been begging our parents for, ever since I’d learned how to ride. We were having my party outside, and I was itching to take my new bike for a ride, but Isi made me wait. She was watching a huge black cloud, forming on the horizon, and … I don’t know … but it seemed like she was talking to it. I swear, it was like the storm and her were having a conversation and, once they were done, then I was allowed to go out and ride my bike. I remember Isi closed her eyes and said, ‘Not yet, please not yet. Just a few more days …’, and the storm cloud blew away. Four days later, most of the world ended but, for those four days, I had a heck of a time on my bike – and, believe me, I have never doubted a word out of my sister’s mouth since.”
Nanook was awestruck by Fyodor’s words. Harland, Fyodor, and Afon continued chatting for a moment, but Nanook could not hear them, lost in his head.
I had always heard rumors of her, Nanook thought, she who can control the wind, the water, the earth, and fire … she w
ho can talk to time. But those were old myths of a woman who lived many thousands of years ago, the first daughter of the Earth. There is a prophecy that she will return again, during the end times – every religion has someone like that, someone to wait for and put your faith in, but my culture mostly covered up her existence. We had a god of the sea, a god of the land, a god of the air, a god of fire, but no one who could control all of the elements. We spoke, only in whispers, of the ancient bloodline – the descendents of the Great Mother. Too many superstitious minds, too many men concerned only with their own power and position, had heard these whispers in the past, and taken gruesome steps to erase the descendents. The lineage was said to be broken, the blood of the Great Mother spilled for the last time, but Isi …
Nanook’s reverie was interrupted by a tug on his shirt from Fyodor.
“I said, what do you think Nanook?”
Fyodor looked at him questioningly.
“I’m sorry, I must’ve dozed off for a second,” Nanook said. “What do I think of what?”
“We were just discussing the hit on Mortterra,” Afon interjected. “Fyodor’s on board, and he thinks that our best bet will come in a few hours. Every morning, at dawn, Ignis Mortterra goes outside, sits down on the ground, and stares into the distance for an hour. Then he goes back inside, when the sunrise ends. If we take a shot at him then, Fyodor thinks the early hour would mean fewer witnesses, and the sunrise should blind those few who might see us to our position. And it’s pretty much the only time we can be guaranteed that Mortterra will be in a specific place. Fyodor says he keeps on the go, is rarely out in the open, and changes his routine daily, even cancelling meetings at the last minute if he gets a bad vibe … all to avoid being an easy target for an assassin. But this one routine, he never changes. No idea why, but who cares? This morning is our opportunity, before Mortterra gets spooked and stops watching the sunrise. Sound good to you Nanook?”
Immortal Earth (Vampires For Earth Book 1) Page 13
