Super World Two

by Lawrence Ambrose

  Jamie's thoughts followed the words with a numbed vacuum, the implications dawning in sickening slow-motion. First, they knew. Second, unless they had direct communication with Mikenruah or Amelrina, they could only know through one of two people. Was it possible Brian hadn't been unconscious? Or had they interrogated her father? An icy jolt of apprehension snapped through her.

  "Where did you hear this?" she asked.

  "From your father and Brian Loving."

  "Are they okay?"

  "They're fine. And I hope you know none of us blames you for not being perfectly candid on this point. Still, we have to ask, Jamie. I have to ask. Are you willing to leave this world so that this death sentence can be lifted?"

  Jamie made herself nod. "Yes."

  "You are willing to leave behind your child? Your husband?"

  "Yes." She squeezed the words past her taut lips.

  "Willing to verifiably end your own life?"

  "That's part of the bargain."

  "To be clear, your answer is: Yes, I am willing to end my life?"

  "Yes."

  "Right now? Today?"

  Jamie felt as if she were drowning in a sea of gloom. The President's insistence on now was a knife blade inching into her head. Now. As if she could kill herself down here...

  But wait. Why did President Tomlinson want me to meet with them here, two miles underground in a giant cage of steel?

  President Tomlinson looked away. At first, Jamie thought she was avoiding her eyes out of guilt, but then it was obvious she was staring at something or someone. She nodded – a nod fraught with a disagreeable gravity.

  "I'm sorry, Jamie –"

  It all came together in a flash. Jamie was flying from the room and down the hall into the elevator before Tomlinson finished her sentence. She blew through the elevator's roof and launched herself up through the narrow, dark elevator shaft toward the surface with everything she had.

  The tunnel lit up an impossibly incandescent white. A camera bulb bursting in her eyes at the DMV a thousand times over – until it was bursting in the center of her brain. An explosion of unfamiliar pain. Burning. Her strength was melting away. But she continued to rise. Newton's First Law hadn't deserted her. She'd launched herself a hundred times faster than a sniper's bullet and there was nowhere to go but up.

  Jamie's next conscious sensation was powerful vibration thrumming through her body. She heard a deep, sustained rumbling like a monster bear trapped in a cavern beneath her. She opened her eyes. A geyser of smoke and debris gushed out from a mountain peak towering to one side of her. Gravel and brush scraped her skin as she pushed herself to one elbow. She was lying in a body-size impression near the base of the mountain. More of a tall hill, really. She was naked. Not a shred of clothing on her body. Of course, that was a given.

  Jamie sat up, pushing hair from her eyes, watching a dark cloud form over the mountain. She kept seeing President Tomlinson's face in the clouds, the heaviness in her expression when she said she was sorry. And Jamie knew. Then it was just a matter of time and speed and how much damage her body could take. She stared down at her unblemished skin. Apparently quite a lot. But probably not enough if she hadn't seen the dark light in Tomlinson's eyes or heard the graveyard apology in her words before the nuke detonated. In that second or two she'd traveled a lot of ground. Ironically, the woman who had sentenced her to death had, in a moment of weakness, saved her life.

  A squadron of fighter jets streaked in and circled like angry hornets. Jamie rose to her feet, staring up at them. They raced in a wide circle with her as their center. She made out a pair of Osprey drones directly overhead, the faint murmur of their engines carrying down to her.

  The fighter jets departed. The drones remained. Jamie considered destroying them, but what was the point? They knew she was alive. She was glad the fighter jets had left instead of attacking her. The temptation to respond might've proven too much.

  She couldn't blame President Tomlinson. She'd told her and her people that she was willing to die to save her world. She might've flown into the sun – the only natural thing she was sure would kill her – but they'd tried to save her the trouble by creating their own nuclear sun here on Earth.

  Jamie blew high into the atmosphere, on the edge of space. She tried to clear her thoughts. What happened now? Did the government have a backup plan? What would they tell her family? What would they do to her family? Maybe Tomlinson would attempt to hold them hostage against her? Kill yourself or we'll kill them. But that strategy could backfire badly from them, she thought. So far, they'd only done what she'd more or less given them permission to do. She hadn't lashed out at the fighter jets. She hadn't attacked anyone. The fighter jets flew away instead of attacking her. A message had been exchanged, she thought: I understand why you tried to kill me, but let's take a moment. A truce until we figure things out. In the meantime, you don't mess with me and I won't mess with you.

  Or maybe that was wishful thinking.

  PRESIDENT TOMLINSON and her advisors watched in grim silence as images from the drones showed a naked but remarkably unscathed blond woman staring defiantly up at them. At least the President considered her hands-on-hips stance and pointed stare defiant.

  "She didn't take the jets out," Vice President Molly Winters said, a force-fed optimism in her voice. "She easily could've."

  President Tomlinson unclenched her hands in her lap and laid them out on the table, breathing out in a long, controlled release of air.

  "Perhaps because she in effect gave us permission," the Vice President added. "I'm sure she understands the dilemma we faced. And I believe she's not the kind of person who would place her life above the common good."

  "Yet FAVMS said she was not being entirely truthful when she claimed she was willing to die. And she clearly was not considering how she bolted from that room."

  "Who would ever be completely willing to die? The way we sprung it on her didn't allow her time to make her peace. She reacted instinctively."

  "Maybe so. Then how do you recommend we proceed?"

  "Back off," said Molly. "Give her a chance to say her goodbyes and do the right thing."

  President Tomlinson surveyed the room. "Anyone else?"

  "I don't see we have much of a choice," grumbled the Secretary of Defense. "We just blew up a 10 megaton bomb in her face and we might as well have slapped her with a wet towel for all the damage it did."

  "In all fairness, Secretary Sanders," said Jacob Kushner, "the bomb detonated for 1.4 seconds from the time she fled. We only have rough estimates on her speed, but even accepting the lowest estimates she could've traveled a considerable distance in that second and a half – perhaps as far as a kilometer or more. The extreme density of Dugway's underground structure would've provided substantial protection."

  "Do you think the blast would've killed her if she'd stayed put?" asked the President.

  "Yes, Ma'am. Speculation, granted, but I feel confident that she would've been vaporized. And it's worth noting that she was incapacitated for a time. She's not physically impervious."

  "While I agree with Vice President Winters' about backing off for now, Madame President," said General Akron, "I believe we should prepare a backup plan should she not follow through on her promise to sacrifice herself. I recommend instructing the Fleet to prepare a strike against her, Madame President."

  "With what, General?" the Defense Secretary asked. "After nuking her, what's left other than antimatter weapons?"

  "As I mentioned before, my first choice would be our ships' laser and particle beam weapons. A MAME missile could be a possible last resort."

  Everyone watched the screen as Jamie rocketed off into the atmosphere beyond the drones' purview.

  "We still have the more individualized options of the Aerial Swarm Platform – ASP – and WANDA," said Jacob Kushner. "And by happy coincidence, WANDA is still in Grand Forks, what I would judge the current most likely destination of Ms. Shepherd. Since Ms. Shepherd kn
ows her and does not consider her a threat – which was the point of using her as an envoy – she would undoubtedly allow Wanda to get close enough to deploy her weaponized nanites. If they fail, I doubt Ms Shepherd would even know she'd been attacked. If they succeed..." He lifted his hands and smiled.

  President Tomlinson didn't return his smile. "How much assurance can you give me that she wouldn't know we attempted to kill her, assuming the nanites failed?"

  Kushner stroked his chin in thought. "Well, if the nanites had a relatively minor effect, she couldn't be sure what happened. If their effect was major, she'd be at least partly incapacitated, if not near death. In that case, we would be in a position to finish her off."

  "How?"

  Kushner shrugged. "My understanding is that a nearby SHE blast stunned her in space. A 20 kiloton SHE round dropped on her head with her already hurting ought to complete the job."

  "A twenty-kiloton blast near a city?"

  "Well, it is North Dakota. And given that the fate of the world at stake..."

  President Tomlinson nodded grudgingly. "Have Wanda return to the Shepherd's property. If Jamie shows up, have your robot sound her out. How is she feeling about us, what are her intentions. I'll make a decision then on how to proceed, depending on her response." She hesitated. "And bring that ASP of yours into position to engage her if necessary."

  "Yes, Ma'am."

  JAMIE DROPPED down in her front yard, unsure of what she'd say to Dennis and her daughter or about what to do next. The obvious thought was to get them to safety, but to where and for how long?

  But neither of them were home. She found a note from Dennis saying that Kylee was still over at the Mayes' and that he was picking up some last-minute groceries at Walmart. Such mundane activities for what could be the last day of her life.

  A blue van rolled down the driveway. Wanda. They'd made the obvious prediction that she would return to her child and Dennis. So now they were sending their errand girl again. Would President Tomlinson want to talk – try to reset the situation? At this moment, Jamie was far from opposed to that.

  Wanda got out and they faced each other. Wanda was wearing an atypical dry smile.

  "How about a cup of coffee?" she suggested.

  "I could do that."

  Inside, Jamie started the coffee machine going while Wanda sat at the kitchen bar counter.

  "The President expresses her regrets over what just happened at Dugway Proving Ground," Wanda stated. "She hopes you'll understand her position and reminds you that you had agreed in principle to surrendering your life."

  "I understand her position. But I would've appreciated some trust and the ability to say goodbye to those I love. I think I earned that."

  "The President might agree, but believes the stakes are too high to allow personal emotions to interfere with her judgment."

  The President's "special envoy" was staring hard at Jamie, as if trying to detect her innermost thoughts.

  "President Tomlinson wishes to know your intentions," she stated. "Do you still intend to honor your promise?"

  "I'm not sure I made a promise." Jamie steadied her anger and her hand as she poured two cups of coffee. It wasn't an anger so much at Tomlinson or the government, but at the absurd unfairness of it all. Her family and this world would've been better off if she'd stayed home. That bitter truth was hard to swallow.

  "You said you were willing to die to save this world."

  Jamie set the coffee cup before her. Wanda startled her by touching her hand. Jamie pulled away.

  "I may be," she said. "But on my terms. For one, I want the safety of my family guaranteed."

  Wanda nodded, still watching her with that hard stare. Jamie sipped from her coffee. She felt an odd tickling in her throat. To her shock, the tickle quickly developed into a sneeze – something she hadn't done since waking up in the hospital after her plunge from the plane. With great effort she clamped her lips together, but a tiny blast of air escaped. Tiny but powerful as it sent Wanda's coffee cup flying and snapped a painting off the far wall.

  The front door opened and Kylee danced in. Her big smile contracted as she noted Jamie's expression and the fallen painting – along with the dark-haired government agent wiping coffee from her face.

  "Mom?"

  "Hi, hon – "

  Jamie covered her mouth as the tickle spread into her chest, firing up a cough. She felt strangely out-of-kilter, on the verge of being sick, while Wanda watched her with cool eyes and the beginnings of a smile.

  The errant sensations eased, their advance down her chest slowing and then stopping, like an army that had encountered in impassable barrier. A final, light tingling and they were gone. Jamie straightened up, feeling back to normal.

  But Kylee had fallen to her knees, clutching her throat. For an instant Jamie couldn't move. She looked from Wanda to her child – Kylee gasping, Wanda's face showing no surprise – and then without thought Jamie was on her knees beside Kaylee, touching her shoulders, having no clue about what to do as Kylee dropped onto her back and stared up at her with wide, pleading blue eyes.

  The logical link between her daughter and her own symptoms moments ago clunked together in her head. She turned to Wanda, her own eyes fierce slits.

  "What did you do?"

  "What do you mean? I'm just standing here."

  "You released some kind of toxic substance. Tell me what you did!"

  The dark-haired young woman shrugged. "Nothing. I did nothing."

  Kylee twitched, mouth gaping. Her eyes started to glaze over.

  "No!" Jamie throttled her voice down. "No."

  "You should probably call 911 or take her to –"

  Jamie was on her, hands gripping Wanda's shoulders, eyeball to eyeball. Jamie felt her resist but strangely give no gasp of pain as her fingers pushed through flesh to her collar bone. Except...something sputtered around her fingers, a crackling like electricity. Jamie blinked. She lifted her forefinger and a silvery metallic object where her collar bone should've been glinted out from the hole her finger had made.

  "What?... What the hell are you?"

  Bizarrely, Wanda smiled in her face and started to fight her. Her eyes lit up, and Jamie felt a heat on her forehead. The woman or cyborg or whatever it was had an unexpected strength, enough that Jamie could feel her resistance and the force of her blows – not hard enough to actually hurt, but they were annoying. Jamie glimpsed her own face in the counter microwave's reflection and noted two dots of red light on her forehead. Lasers? Coming from the thing's eyes?

  Jamie was less fighting her than trying to restrain her without killing her – and only because she needed answers. Patience fraying, she slammed Wanda to the floor and pinned her there telekinetically.

  "If you value your life," Jamie hissed, resisting a stab of despair as she glanced at the still form of her daughter, "tell me what you've done! What's the antidote? Tell me, or I swear I will rip you limb from limb!"

  "It's too late."

  Jamie flew from her to her daughter's side. Kylee lay sprawled, a puzzled frown on her rosebud lips, her wide-open eyes staring blindly – her baby reduced to a beautiful, lifeless doll –

  "No!" Jamie touched the side of her neck. Nothing. "No, no, no...!" She moved her hands gently over her body, over her face, easing a strand of hair from her brow. So much power and yet so utterly powerless. She peered down at her daughter, her vision blurring. She blinked, and some of her tears splashed down in Kylee's unseeing eyes.

  Behind her, Wanda was staggering to her feet, lurching from one leg to the other, a drunken sailor on a storm-slapped ship. Jamie smacked her telekinetically and she blew apart. No blood and gore, just flaps of skin-like material, circuitry, servomechanisms, and plenty of things Jamie couldn't identify. She was momentarily thankful for the cleanliness of her obliteration. Whatever satisfaction she felt was crushed as her current nightmare rushed back in to fill her consciousness.

  Only one thing I can do. Jamie raised her daugh
ter, and together they flew through the open front door up into the sky. No need for her usual breakneck speed. The hospital was only a few miles away. She'd have her in the ER in a minute or two at most. What could she tell them? That thing had released something toxic in the air, something strong enough to affect even her. What chance did her daughter have –

  Jamie crushed that thought just as she'd crushed "Wanda." The doctors would figure out a way. They could restart her heart, put her on some life-sustaining machine, keep her going long enough to bring in some specialist who'd know what they were dealing with. That would happen. That had to happen.

  A small light flared at the corner of her vision. She zoned in on it. A missile!? Jamie couldn't see what had fired it, but there was no doubting it was locked onto her and headed her way. Shooting missiles at me while I'm flying with my child. She suppressed her outrage and guided the missile in a loop up and away from her. Once it was pointed to the heavens, she pushed it as hard as she dared toward the upper atmosphere. No telling what kind of explosive it was. For all she knew, it could be a nuke. These people were fucking insane and had not a shred of morality.

  The missile detonated miles above her, its brilliant flash and the roaring shockwave suggesting that the nuke possibility wasn't so farfetched after all. Jamie held her daughter close to her chest, shielding her. The blast blew by, flattening some trees and cornfields below. Nuclear, then. Or one of their high-tech super-explosives. She was less than a mile out of town. If she hadn't diverted the missile, hundreds if not thousands of lives might've been lost. These people really were insane. Or so hardcore in their beliefs that they might as well be.