Dream Sky

by Brett Battles

  She had barely begun when Pax entered the room.

  “Nyla, hold for a moment,” Ash said. He motioned for Pax to join them and then touched Crystal on the shoulder. “Put her on speaker.”

  “What’s going on?” Pax asked.

  Instead of answering, Ash said, “Nyla, Rich Paxton is here with me now. Do you mind starting over?”

  “No problem.”

  She told them about Martina Gable and her friends, all of whom were survivors, and all of whom had been stricken with the flu the previous spring. She described the special holding area at the Los Angeles survival station, and that a head count of the people inside was larger than the group Martina had been with.

  “The other holding areas have been pretty much emptied out,” she said. Though the pattern was sporadic at the moment, teams had reported similar purges at other stations. They all knew this meant Project Eden had begun eliminating the survivors they’d collected. “Thankfully, we’ve had a drastic reduction in the number of new arrivals here since Tamara’s message started playing, and out of those, we’ve been able to get to most before they reached the station. What I’m concerned about is what the Project’s going to do about this immune group.” She paused. “Sir, I’m tired of watching people die. We need to get them out.”

  “How large is your team?” he asked.

  “Eight.”

  There was a voice in the background. Ash couldn’t understand what was being said, but it was clearly defiant.

  Nyla said into the phone, “Nine, if we count Martina.”

  “And how many people does the Project have there?”

  “Rough estimate, twenty-five to thirty guards and a couple dozen ancillary personnel.”

  “Give us a moment here, okay?” Ash said.

  “Sure,” Nyla replied.

  Crystal muted the call.

  “Do we have anyone we can send out there to help them?” Ash asked.

  As Crystal thought about it, her face was already projecting the answer. “We’re stretched thin. We’ve got teams at only ten percent of the survival stations as it is. We could maybe break one of them free, but that would compromise the location where they’re working.”

  “No. I don’t want to do that. What about here at the base?”

  “We’re already operating at bare bones,” she said. “I’m sorry. We don’t have anyone left.”

  “Actually, we do,” Pax said.

  They both looked at him.

  “We have a hundred twenty-nine people just sitting around over in Ely.”

  “The Isabella Island group? But they’re just…tourists,” Ash said. “They’re not trained to do anything like this.”

  “None of us are really trained for this,” Pax said.

  “You know what I mean.”

  “I do, but what choice do we have? Besides, they might have been tourists when they went to the island, but they had lives before that. Who knows? Some might even have a military background.” He shrugged. “It’s the end of the world, Captain. All hands on deck.”

  Ash considered it for a moment and then nodded. “All right. We can at least ask them.”

  “Exactly what I was thinking.”

  “Put her back on,” Ash said to Crystal. He glanced at Pax and grinned. “If you recall, I was army, not navy. So next time I’d prefer a more appropriate metaphor.”

  __________

  CALEB STARED AT the pad of paper.

  “I got it. I…got it!” He looked up. “I got…”

  His words cut out as he realized he was alone in Matt’s room. Last he remembered, Chloe had been there, too. He had no idea if that had been ten minutes ago or two hours.

  He looked down at the pad again and rechecked his final bit of decryption. Those extra numbers in several of the sets had been the biggest trouble, but everything had finally clicked, making him feel like an idiot for not figuring it out sooner. Of course, he still needed to check it on a computer, but as far as he was concerned, that was only a formality.

  He grinned at his handiwork. Breaking into Project Eden’s communications network by night, solving encrypted messages by day. Damn, he was good.

  Chloe. I need to find Chloe.

  As he shot off the bed, several of Matt’s journals and dozens of pieces of paper tumbled to the floor. Ignoring them, he crossed the room and yanked the door open.

  “Chloe!” he yelled as he entered the hallway. “Chloe!”

  He heard a door behind him open. He swung around.

  “What’s going on?” Not Chloe, Rachel.

  “Oh, um, I’m sorry, ma’am,” Caleb said. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. I’m, uh, looking for Chloe.”

  Rachel stepped into the hall. “Why would Chloe be—” She stopped as her gaze fell on the open door to her brother’s suite. “Were you in Matt’s room?” She walked quickly to the doorway.

  “I was just…I…I gotta find Chloe.” He whipped back around and started jogging down the hall.

  “Caleb! I want to talk to you!” Rachel called after him.

  He kept going, not allowing himself to breathe until he turned down the hallway to the main portion of the base.

  He found three people in the cafeteria.

  “I’m looking for Chloe. Have you seen her?”

  Head shakes.

  He was about to ask the same question when he reached the comm room, but a quick look through the door told him everyone was busy.

  He almost ran past the gym without stopping, but the rhythmic bass throbbing from inside made him stutter step and return to the door. As he opened it, he winced at the music blasting from inside. Chloe was the only one there, keeping pace with the drumbeat on a stair-step machine in the corner.

  Afraid his eardrums would burst if he took a step inside, he yelled her name. He might as well have been running around naked in a pitch-black room for all the good it did. Bracing himself, he took a step over the threshold and yelled again, this time waving the pad of paper in the air. That did the trick.

  She hopped off the machine, picked a remote off the ground, and hit a button. The music cut out.

  “Are you done?” she asked, using a towel to wipe the sweat off her face as she walked over.

  “Uh-huh.”

  She motioned at the pad of paper. “That it?”

  “Uh, yeah.”

  Holding out a hand, she said, “Let me see it.”

  “There’s, um, something you might want to deal with first.”

  __________

  THEY FOUND RACHEL kneeling on the floor of Matt’s room, picking up the journals. All the wads of paper had already been tossed in the trash.

  “Rachel?” Chloe said.

  Rachel turned. “What the hell is going on here? These are Matt’s personal journals. Who gave you permission to go through them?”

  Chloe stepped toward her. “Rachel, it’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay,” Rachel said, slamming the journal she’d been holding onto the bed. “These are my brother’s things! This is his room! You have no right to be in here!”

  It took all of Chloe’s will to maintain her cool. These were not the kind of situations she’d ever been very good at. “We had no choice. We had to come—”

  Pushing herself to her feet, Rachel said, “You what? Coming in here was not a choice! You didn’t even think to ask me?”

  “You needed your rest.”

  Rachel looked between the two of them. “I want you and Caleb to confine yourselves to your quarters. You will—”

  “Caleb had nothing to do with this. He was doing what Ash and I asked him to.”

  “Captain Ash is in on this, too? What has happened to all of you?”

  “What has happened,” Chloe said, her jaw tensing, “is that Matt left us a message and we’ve been trying to figure out what it means. I realize that his death has been very difficult for you, but we couldn’t just stop doing anything until you were ready. We are in the middle of a war we are losing badly. We need
every advantage we can get, and if your brother’s message points us toward something that will help, then we need to know what he meant.” A brief pause. “I’m sorry we did not ask your permission, but we didn’t do anything wrong. Matt is dead. There is nothing that will change that. But there are people out there who need our help to stay alive. So, no, we will not detain ourselves in our rooms. And, no, we will not stop looking at your brother’s journals.”

  Rachel stared at Chloe, stunned.

  “Actually,” Caleb said, “I don’t think we need the journals anymore. I’ve figure out the—”

  “Shut up,” Chloe said, her words meant for Caleb but her gaze still on Rachel.

  Rachel’s lips parted. After a few false starts, she said, “What message?”

  ELY, NEVADA

  PAX HAD CALLED ahead, so when he and Ash arrived at the hotel, Robert had already gathered everyone in the largest meeting room available. There were some handshakes, a lot of hellos, and a few inevitable grumbles of dissatisfaction with the living arrangements. As the others took their seats, Pax and Ash moved to the front of the room.

  “Well, as I warned you on the plane, the weather here’s only slightly cooler than what you’d been experiencing back on the island,” Pax said.

  A smattering of laughter.

  “Can’t say it’ll be getting much warmer anytime soon,” he said. “But the good news is, you are all safe.”

  A few people clapped.

  “How long are we going to have to stay here?” someone shouted.

  Several others said, “Shhh.”

  “It’s all right,” Pax said. “A natural question. First off, you can leave anytime you want. There are cars on every street. All you have to do is get in one and drive away. No one will stop you, but if something happens to you, no one will be around to help you, either. For those who choose to stay, I’m not going to lie to you and give you any kind of time frame. Truth is, we have no idea when you’ll be able to get out of here. We do plan on finding someplace more permanent, but other matters are taking precedence right now.”

  He looked around the room before launching into what he’d really come to say. “Without outside help, none of you would be alive today. I’m not saying that to gain a cheap pat on the back. I’m saying it because it is a fact. It’s also a fact that others like you are out there. We have people scattered around the globe trying to help them, but we can’t be everywhere.” He could see he had everyone’s full attention now. “I’d like to tell you about one of the survival stations and what’s been happening there…”

  __________

  PAX’S STORY ABOUT Los Angeles was greeted with shocked stares and more than a few tears. Even though Robert and his fellow Isabella Island survivors had seen firsthand what Project Eden could do, it still seemed so incredible, so unbelievably horrible.

  Robert could barely hold in his own emotions upon hearing about people who had voluntarily gone to the station, thinking they were going to get help, only to have their lives taken. Estella was a wreck, leaning against him, her wet cheeks pressed against his arm.

  When Pax finished the story, he said, “I tell you all this because we have an opportunity here to do something right. At least twenty people are still being held there that we can get out. We have some people on the ground keeping an eye on things, but there are too few of them to make a move. What we need is help, and that’s why I’ve come to you.”

  “Wait, are you—what do you call it?—forcing us into your army?” The question came from Bertrand Tailler, the same asshole who had almost made Robert miss the plane. He was sitting alone in the back corner.

  “No, not at all,” Pax told him in a much calmer voice than Robert would have used. “What I’m saying is, we need volunteers. Military training is a plus, but it’s not necessary. If you don’t want to volunteer, that’s completely fine. No judgment. Any questions?”

  There were a few, mostly about the danger involved.

  “Yes, there’s a chance someone will get hurt.” Pax said. “Will anyone die? It’s a distinct possibility. This isn’t the old world anymore. Our lives will never be as comfortable as they used to be.”

  “You expect people to volunteer to die?” Bertrand said. “Good luck with that.”

  “Thank you,” Pax said, ignoring the sarcasm. “Anyone else have something they want to say?”

  A few indistinct whispers, but no more questions.

  “All right, then. We’ll do this the simple way. If you’re willing to volunteer, raise your hand.”

  No hands shot up.

  Robert looked around, wondering what was wrong with these people. Pax and his friends had saved them. If the Resistance needed help, they should get it.

  That’s when he realized he had yet to raise his own hand. He lifted it into the air. He didn’t know how much help he could be—he’d been scared to death when he went after the hijackers on the Albino Mer—but he figured he could do something.

  Estella sat up straight and raised her own hand.

  __________

  ASH WATCHED AS hands rose like a reverse game of tumbling dominoes. Even two of the people who’d become sick after receiving the vaccine, but had improved enough to come to the meeting, volunteered. Pax thanked them but excused them from service.

  Ash and Pax had been hoping for fifteen people. The final tally was thirty-seven.

  They gave everyone time to gather their things, then loaded the volunteers onto one of the buses that had ferried the group up from Las Vegas. With Pax behind the wheel, they headed for Ward Mountain, where everyone would be equipped as best as possible before heading for the airplanes that would take them to Los Angeles.

  A few miles out of Ely, Pax reached under his seat and pulled out the bag he’d brought along. “Sat phone’s ringing,” he said, tossing the pack over to where Ash was standing.

  Ash pulled the phone out and hit ACCEPT.

  “This is Ash.”

  “What the hell happened to you?” Chloe did not sound happy. “I’ve been trying to call you for like an hour.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Not wrong,” she said. “Caleb’s decoded the entire message.”

  “Fantastic. What’s it—”

  “Do you want to know the best part?”

  “Is that a trick question?”

  “Fine, I’ll wait until you get back. You are coming back, aren’t you?”

  “What’s the best part?”

  It wasn’t hard to imagine the sly smile on her face as she said, “I said when you get back.”

  “Chloe!”

  “Okay, okay. We know where Dream Sky is.”

  WARD MOUNTAIN NORTH

  WHILE ASH HAD expected Chloe to be with Caleb when he and Pax entered the conference room, Rachel’s presence was a surprise.

  He almost asked if she was all right but stopped himself. Instead, he said, “I’m glad to see you.”

  She nodded, a quick, humorless smile gracing her lips.

  Pax walked up to her and put his arms around her, whispering something Ash couldn’t hear.

  When they parted, she said, “Thank you.” In a louder voice, “We should start.”

  Chloe looked at Caleb. “Tell them.”

  “Right. Okay, so some of the messages were confusing the hell out of me,” Caleb said as he grabbed one of the journals on the table. He flipped through a few pages, then turned the book so everyone could see. It was one of entries that had a sequence of numbers at the end. He pointed at the numbers. “Every once in a while when I decrypted one of these, there would still be a few numbers left. Anywhere from one to three digits. At first I figured they were placeholders and concentrated on the bigger messages.”

  “And?” Ash asked.

  Caleb traded the journal for a well-used legal pad. “I’ve got all the messages right here.” He tossed it into the center of the table. “It’s one sided, though. Just the responses Matt received. As far as I can tell, he didn’t keep a
record of his side of things. Still, you can pretty much figure out what they were talking about.

  “The earlier messages all concern the what and where of DS. And before you ask, he never says Dream Sky, only uses the initials and sometimes not even that. At one point, C8 says he thinks it might be a secret supply dump. Later he suggests it’s a weapon of some kind. He throws out a bunch of other possibilities, too. Apparently Matt had an idea of what it was, but C8 didn’t agree. He kept saying things like there was no way Matt was right, and he could find no proof of Matt’s theory, and even went so far as to tell Matt that he had to be wrong and they were wasting time pursuing the idea. They did agree that from the secrecy surrounding it, it seems to be a key to the Project’s success. They don’t mention why they believe this, but if you read between the lines, it’s pretty clear it’s based on something Matt had known when he was still on the inside. Which, by the way, still blows my mind that he was part of them. How could he hide it from—”

  “Stick to the subject,” Chloe told him before Ash could say something similar.

  “Oh, right.” Caleb glanced at Rachel. “Sorry.” He took a moment to regain his composure before restarting. “Several years ago, C8 changed his tune, and began saying that they’d been wrong. That DS didn’t exist. I mean, he really tried to sell Matt on it. It was like something spooked him and he didn’t want any part of it.” He smiled. “Interestingly, it was around this time he started including the odd stray numbers in his messages.” Caleb gestured at the pad. “Matt asked him about the extras and why they didn’t work into the code. C8 played them off as nothing important, which, as I was first going through them, was exactly what I was thinking.”

  “But they weren’t filler,” Rachel said.

  Caleb grinned again. “No, they were not. But I wouldn’t have figured it out if it weren’t for the message Matt passed on to Captain Ash. Well, the Augustine part, anyway. It unlocked that last set, where I discovered four more strays. That really bothered me. That was more than any of the previous messages had had. So why were there so many now? I was having a hard time continuing to think they were simply filler. I was missing something. So I put all the strays on a single piece of paper.”