Point Apocalypse

by Alex Bobl

  The light in front of me faded. A long shadow lay across the floor. Someone had breached the hallway and was barking orders. I was halfway to the exit next to where the deformed bucket still lay in the niche. I'd completely forgotten about it. My foot got caught on it sending it rattling and I stumbled hitting my shoulder on the wall.

  Now I could use the infrared camera! I infinitely regretted not having taken the cyber's tactical helmet and vest. The element of surprise was lost. The soldier who'd backed into the hallway was in full combat gear. We raised our weapons simultaneously and fired.

  He sprang back toward the exit. I ducked onto the floor banging my hip on a stone. The soldier's bullets whizzed a meter above my head; mine also hadn't found their target. I sat up and pushed myself back into the niche with my heels when still more shots rang out in the hallway.

  This time the soldier was more accurate. I was saved by a stone ledge. Bullets sprayed it chipping bits off one and scratching my cheek. The enemy had changed the fire rate and were shooting single rounds moving along the hallway not letting me stick my head out. I pressed my back to the stone and pulled my legs up hugging my gun, unable to do anything.

  The soldier's gun fell silent. The magazine clattered to the floor as it fell from its catch. I jumped up and made a dart for my adversary squeezing the trigger...

  I heard the dry click of the electric discharger. My magazine was empty too. I lunged at him with the barrel of the gun aiming for his neck and jabbed him.

  The soldier tilted his head forward. The anti-recoil system of my barrel had pierced his visor. I swung the butt of the gun into his shoulder and kicked him in the groin when an explosion boomed behind his back. My eyes went blank.

  The shock wave sent us reeling to the floor. Tongues of fire roared along the hallway burning up the oxygen. I held my breath and shut my eyes. The dead soldier's body shielded me. For a few seconds, the flame raged above us and then died away.

  I heaved the burnt corpse off me, turned onto my stomach and crawled toward the exit on all fours. The memory chip started ranting again urging me to report to the medical block. My eye was stinging from the recently-extracted lens. My head rang like a bell and my nose bled.

  Forcing my limbs to move, I crawled to the exit, hugged the wall and pulled myself up. Gasping mouthfuls of burned cordite-filled air, I threw myself out of the building.

  I couldn't hear any shooting, only faraway voices and the shuffle of hurried steps. I wanted to turn on my back and take a lungful of air but I only had enough strength to lift my head and place my cheek on the sand.

  "Look, it's Mark!" a familiar voice came from beside me. "Jim, it's him! Big as life and twice as ugly!"

  On my left-hand side, Lars Swenson's thick voice was bellowing commands.

  Finally it dawned on me that the guards' resistance had been broken. Most likely, all the soldiers had also been eliminated. A bit too late, if you'd ask me. I wished Swenson had made it here earlier. But then things could have taken a different turn and Blank with his cyber troopers, combat vehicles and with a squad of duty guards could have made a short job of the loggers' militia.

  Someone grabbed me by the shoulders and turfed me onto my back. Jim's freckled face loomed over me. He was smiling.

  "Oakum, what're you waiting for?" Georgie croaked, approaching. "Lift him. Fritz, help him!"

  A lank man in a pea-coat with faded silver-lace patches on its shoulders pushed Jim aside and bent down to me. He grabbed the lapels of my jacket and jerked me into a sitting position. He had fiery red hair, a mustache and a neat little beard. The still-smoking mouth of a grenade launcher hung on his back.

  I poked his chest with my finger. "Are you Havlow? The tanker engineer?"

  He cast me a surprised glance and shrank back, chewing energetically on his tobacco, the epitome of how Lars Swenson had described him to me. Go to the riggers and find Fritz Havlow, he'd said.

  "How d'you know me?"

  "From them," I nodded at the loggers.

  The giant Swenson was busy ordering his men around. He bellowed commands and swung his arms as he motioned them each to their own place on the platform in front of the gasometer, telling them what to collect as trophies and what not to touch until he'd had a moment to inspect it.

  There were more people buzzing amid the ruins, commanded by a tightly built stocky man in a sooty captain's cap.

  "Any guards left in the building?" Fritz asked.

  "None," I looked at Georgie limping toward us.

  He looked considerably fresher than during our last meeting, except for his leaner frame and sunken eyes on a gaunt face.

  Leaning on Jim's arm, I got back to my feet. "How did you get out?"

  "Remember the cellar at the farmers'? The ice room?" Georgie slapped my shoulder. "We took cover there. In the morning, we got to the river and caught the New Pang ferry on its way to the riggers'. So..." he massaged his injured leg.

  "I see," I paused and cleared my throat. "And the farm woman? Her children?"

  "All alive. Akhmad died, though."

  "I know."

  From under his pea-coat, Fritz produced a Parabellum handgun. He stepped through the entrance and peeped down the hallway but recoiled and waved his hand in front of his nose.

  "You can't..." he swallowed, "you can't breathe in there! How did you survive?"

  Without answering, I took the flask offered by Jim and gulped down half its contents, then cleaned my face and eyes with the rest.

  "I fired a thermobaric round down there! At twenty paces," Fritz said.

  "Leave him alone," Georgie said. "The guy needs a breather."

  "Later," I handed the flask back to Jim and pointed toward the entrance. "There're Wladas and Kathy down there."

  "No! That ass of a clone is still around!" Georgie stepped toward the opening but I held him back by his shoulder.

  "She is, and she's saved my life."

  "Long time no see!" I heard from behind my back. Lars Swenson approached us accompanied by a few young armed militiamen.

  "You've done it, Private. Congrats!" he shook my hand without stopping.

  "Too early to congratulate," I squeezed his broad palm. "Clones and the cyber troopers are now heading for New Pang. They're driving to see McLean who's going to help them ship their cargo to the Fort. The cargo contains an assault virus destined for Earth. It'll cause the death of millions. We need to contact the Fort and warn them about it."

  Lars' face didn't twitch. After a moment's thought, he said,

  "There's only one option, right? We have to stop the cybers, is that what you mean?"

  I nodded. He was quick on the draw. No need to give him the details.

  "When and how did they leave?" he asked.

  "They left before sunrise, in combat vehicles."

  "We just missed each other," he turned and shielded his eyes looking at the sun hovering over the horizon. "We won't make it," he turned back to me and shook his head. "If they have combat vehicles, we'll need an airplane to catch up with them."

  "Don't you have the radio? You can contact the jumpgate and pass the information on to their commander."

  "Won't work," Lard shook his head. "It's not strong enough. I'll need a signal amplifier to reach them. And the amplifier is at McLean's place."

  I cursed through clenched teeth and looked at the militants crowded around me.

  "Be prepared to defend this place, just in case. When cybers don't receive the next guards' report, they might come back."

  "What do you suggest?" concern clouded Lars' face.

  "Just dig in and hold the entrance. Make sure not one of the motherfuckers gets into the building."

  "And you?"

  "I have an idea. Bur first, I need to get to the tanker. How far is the riggers' base?"

  "Twenty-five miles or so," Fritz said.

  "Are there any emergency exit systems left there?

  Fritz nodded.

  "You think you can spare a fast car?"
>
  Again he nodded.

  "Let's go then," I stepped toward the platform. "Shit," I stepped back. "I have two people left inside. A man and a woman. Georgie and Jim know them. Also, two neurotechs we've taken prisoner and a hell of a lot of equipment worth keeping."

  Lars' eyes glinted when he heard about the equipment. He glanced at Georgie. Fritz chuckled: he, with his technical and entrepreneurial skills, didn't want to let this booty slip through his fingers. The last thing I needed was a loggers and riggers' squabble over the loot.

  "Best not to touch anything until I'm back," I tried to sound convincing. "Don't try to turn anything on or off. Apart from the lab equipment, they also have the Forecomers machine that could take us all back to Earth."

  Georgie's jaw dropped. Fritz cleared his throat. Lars ran his strong hand across his face and beard.

  "Jim," I continued. "You go down first. Tell Kathy and Wladas that they're safe."

  "Sure."

  "Lars, you make sure our Georgie here doesn't smoke the girl. They feel too strong for each other."

  Georgie darkened.

  "Promise to make sure they're okay?" I asked him.

  Lars grunted. "The word of the King of the Forest."

  "Let's go, then? " I turned to the red-headed Fritz.

  He stared at the ruins and the remains of the solar panels scavenged by the riggers. The guy in the captain's cap was dishing out orders.

  "I'll give you a thousand gold pieces," Lars said unexpectedly. "We can deal with your captain later. Now go, we don't have much time."

  Fritz nodded with a lopsided grin.

  "Take Georgie with you," Lars added, winking at him.

  He knew where his interests lay, I thought as I followed Fritz out to the car. Lars tried to keep everything under his own control. He knew the stakes had risen very high indeed.

  Chapter Four

  As the Crow Flies

  It took our open-top Willys less than an hour to get to the desert. I thought at first that the ragged brown outline that caught my eye behind the smooth dunes was a far-off mountain. Then I realized that it was in fact our destination.

  Fritz drove. I kept glancing back from my passenger's seat checking for Blank's reserve combat vehicles. Georgie sat in the back. The old Army jeep groaned as it rocked over the dunes. The windshield was folded forward but the desert air flow didn't bring relief as the sun stood high at its zenith beating down like a blow heater. We were approaching the riggers' base, or rather, the stranded Samotlor tanker that I had mistaken for a mountain.

  I'd seen a few large vessels in my lifetime. Atomic cruisers and submarine missile launchers, and even Chinese intercontinental clone carriers. But they'd all been sitting in the water hiding the bulk of their body from view.

  Now it was different. The slanting aft of the ship had grown into the sand. Its stem rose above the dunes that concealed half its body. When we drove closer, Fritz made a sharp turn and instead of driving between the dunes toward the ship's rusty side and the deck structures, steered the jeep at almost a right angle to it. The worn-out painted digits of the tanker's draught markings still showed on its bow.

  I stood up in my seat and craned my neck trying to make out the hatches of the emergency exit systems' launching tubes. I knew they had to be somewhere under the cabins. But the jeep swerved again, and the dunes swallowed up the ship.

  "Sit still. You'll see it all in a while," Fritz said.

  I'd already told him on our way there what exactly I needed parts of the launching systems for. But I hadn't yet explained how or where I was going to use them. These days, all superships were equipped with two-seat ejection capsules, located aft, that allowed the crew to abandon ship in case of fast fracture.

  My idea was to remove the capsules' gunpowder engines and use them to make a quick copy of an assault jetpack. I'd studied them at army school and knew that the thrust principle was the same in both. I also wanted to use the drag chute to decelerate in case I rocketed too high in the air. The riggers' base had everything necessary for my purpose: a workshop, tools, a welding machine and even a savvy mechanic in the shape of Fritz himself.

  The jeep mounted a shallow crest and drove along a narrow wadi between the dunes. The well-used tracks ribboned down into a deep crater.

  Its shallow front edge was shaped like a horseshoe. That's why Fritz hadn't driven straight on. We'd have simply toppled down. The tanker's enormous side loomed up from afar serving as the rear wall of the crater. The paint was peeling off in many places. Below, rough wooden ramps led to ragged openings cut into the ship's side with welding torches. Bent pipes protruded from the widest opening and led underground.

  Squat sandstone structures crowded the bottom of the crater. Closer to the entrance, two tents stood away from the rest with a swing gate between them. Further on, a rectangular platform fenced-off with barbed wire was studded with the straight rows of filler spouts of the oil containers buried below. I counted almost two dozen of them. In the center of the platform stood an unusual machine with a pivoted rod and a spool of thick ridged pipe.

  "Is that the oil tank?" I turned to Fritz pointing at the platform.

  "Exactly," he said slowing up and shifting down.

  "And where's the rig and the supply vessel?"

  "I have a funny feeling you've been here before," Fritz cast me a quick glance.

  "It's not important. Just answer the question."

  "They've dismantled the rig," he said after a pause, shifting up. "Its remains are still lying on the shore. When this shit landed here, the tanker and the tug were luckier than the rest of it. It took us five years to dig the rig out of the sand bit by bit. Finally we built the tank and pumped most of the fuel into it.

  "Wise move," I nodded. It's best to keep fuel underground in this heat. The old rig could have exploded, God forbid if they hadn't done it.

  "All right, then. And where's the supply vessel?"

  "The bulk carrier? It's far from here," Fritz thumbed behind his back.

  "Yes," bored by the whole trip, Georgie poked his head out from between the seats pointing back. "It took the raiders a long time to find it. We only recognized it by the mast housing above the cockpit. It stuck out of the sand in the middle of the desert."

  "And how did it end up underground?" I asked.

  "How do you expect me to know?" Georgie answered.

  "Can you see how the tanker's standing?" Fritz nodded at the behemoth in front. "Why are you asking?"

  "Fine," I sat back. "So did you dig the carrier out?"

  "You bet your life we did," Fritz grinned. "We worked three shifts shoveling sand. There was gold there. Haven't you heard? The convoy was on its way back from the Arctic gold mines when Pangea had appeared."

  "And what about the tug?" I was surprised I couldn't see any people down in the crater. Two lookouts hovered on top of the cockpit studying the terrain through their field glasses. Another one - apparently the watch commander - leaned on his elbows against the window's ragged steel edge staring at us.

  "Are you talking about Svyatoslav Norg? The icebreaker?"

  "Exactly."

  "It landed right in the middle of the river. Just sat there rocking on the waves as if it had always been there. The crew didn't even know what had hit them. They stopped the engine and jumped ship, and then.."

  "But where is everyone?" I interrupted him. "Why are there no people down there?"

  "Look at the sky," Georgie answered as Fritz steered the jeep along the tanker's side toward a steep long gangway. "The work shift are busting their asses at the river. The others are chilling out in the cellars waiting for the heat to subside. And the rest," he nodded at the road, "are in the old city with the loggers. They're the ones who got you out of the shit."

  "I see."

  Fritz killed the engine, jumped out of the jeep and hurried up the gangway. We followed.

  "Slow down, will ya," Georgie limped up the steps behind us mentioning clones under his breath. "I
can't keep up with you two!"

  We were met by a gaunt gray-haired little man in knee-long shorts, a torn sailor tank top, a pair of thongs and a faded bucket hat with a greasy rim.

  "Why are you back, Fritz?" he demanded casting suspicious glances at me and the wheezing Georgie behind our backs.

  On his belt hung an ancient yellow-leather gun holster. A revolver handle peeped out from under the flap, a thin leather strap hooked to a ring on it. The man, as if accidentally, lay his hand onto the gun and moved a finger unbuttoning the flap.

  "Relax, Stepanych," Fritz swept his arm pointing at us. "They're friends. We only need to get to the safety capsules. We need to remove a few things."

  "Does the captain know?" Stepanych, squinting, distrusted us. "I know you, Fritz. You want to sell the damn things. It's all right but what if we need them capsules later ourselves?"

  "Listen, old man," I stepped forward. "The safety capsules up here can save our asses. Yours, mine and everyone's. Everyone on the Continent."

  "What the fuck is that? Who are you to raise your voice here like that?" the man's hand moved to draw but Fritz grabbed his wrist, shoved discreetly a couple of coins into his other hand and stepped closer, whispering in his ear.

  When Stepanych moved away, he wrinkled his nose and scratched his head. His lips moved in silence. His face reflected the strain of mental work.

  "You there," he rotated his index finger at his temple, "you'd better think before you open your mouth."

  "We only need to get to the capsules," Fritz said. "Then we'll pop into the workshop and we'll be on our way. The work shift will still be at the river. They'll never even know we've been here."

  Stepanych glanced at the lookouts on top of the cockpit and fingered his long gray mustache.

  "All right, damn you. Go," he stepped back to the railing to let us pass and added at our backs, "I'm afraid I've got to report to the captain anyways."

  "Be my guest," Fritz waved him off and walked toward the cabin deck. Without turning, he said, "Georgie, you've been on the lower decks, you take the customer to the safety capsules."