CICADA: A Stone Age World Novel

by M. L. Banner

  Melanie and Carrington walked in, followed by the other two, as all moved to the window-wall that looked out at the other half of Bios-2 and the shantytown beyond their main gate. It wasn’t so much of a town as hodge-podge clusters of tents, canopies, cardboard boxes and piled debris. It looked like a third-world country’s poorest city. Melanie guessed that this was probably a common sight throughout what remained of America. Hundreds of people lived right outside their walls, struggling to survive, waiting for handouts from Bios-2 that would never come.

  About a half mile away, a large cluster of people surrounded a raised platform where four men stood, bound to posts.

  “What’s going on there?” Carrington asked.

  Melanie felt someone bump her shoulder and realized that Lunder had brought binoculars and handed one to each of them. She raised them to her eyes and focused on the platform. Two men, dressed in red robes, stood on each end of the platform, each with a military rifle slung around his neck, obviously ready to use them if provoked.

  A single-file line of a dozen or so other men walked toward the platform from the back. One man, who wore a bright white robe, hopped up onto the platform and thrust his hands into the air, apparently to quiet the crowd, although the observers couldn’t hear anything.

  Lunder slipped out without them noticing and flipped off the EPF. The platform, its actors and its audience were at once brighter and more clear, like a giant set of stage lights were powered on.

  “Is this display for us?” Melanie asked without averting her eyes. Almost as if in answer, the speakers in the room crackled and then static buzzed in the room. A voice crackled through the static.

  “People, these men are yours, but they attempted to kill me and my men, so they shall pay. But first, you must get a foretaste of the justice that we serve, because our justice will be your master. For our book says, thou may walk in the Valley of Death, but you shall fear no evil; for thine laws comfort me.”

  Melanie looked over to Lunder and saw that he was aiming at the platform what looked like a gun with a parabolic dish attached to its end.

  The man in white walked over to a man in a police shirt with a police badge dangling from a pocket. He was bloodied, like he had been knocked around a bit. Now there were more men on the platform, all wearing bright crimson robes. Each seemed to sport a physical reminder that they had been through their own personal hell: two were missing arms, two had eye patches and she could have sworn one was missing his tongue, as his mouth hung open like his jaw wouldn’t close.

  “This man,” he proclaimed as he pointed to the man in the police shirt, “broke a simple law. He lied to us. Our book says, if a man lies, it is better to pluck out his tongue than lose the whole man to his sin.”

  Two men approached Police Shirt on either side of him and held his head to the post with gloved hands; his terror-filled screams could be heard even though the dish was pointed at the leader on the opposite end of the platform. Another man approached Police Shirt, holding a hook in one hand and a knife in another. The two men on either side pried his mouth open. The man with the hook and knife was swift. Smooth as oil, he hooked the man’s tongue, pulled it out taut, sliced it and held it over his head for the screaming throng to see.

  Melanie’s stomach turned, and she tried to shut out the blood and muffled screams by closing her eyes.

  “Can’t you do anything about this?” Carrington begged.

  “Why should we?” Lunder answered. “This is how savages deal with one of their own. Continue looking.”

  Melanie looked up again and saw Police Shirt writhing in pain, his hands bound behind him around the post. Each time he screamed, a gush of blood squirted out into the crowd, which stepped further back. The men in robes, except the speaker who stayed on the opposite corner of the stage, exited toward Bios-2, marched a few paces and then turned and aimed their rifles at the men.

  The nearby crowd scattered like roaches.

  The man in the bright white robe bellowed, “I will execute terrible vengeance against them and punish them in my wrath. They will know that I am a god.”

  All four slumped over, blood welling from bullet holes, still held to the posts by their bindings.

  “Any of you who commit any sins against me or my men will be dealt with as harshly as these men.” He jumped down from the platform and strode to his encampment in the trees, followed by the men in red.

  “You see, that is life outside of these walls.” Westerling was staring at Carrington and Melanie each clutching the other. “But in here you have safety. Please see that the other scientists hear the message.”

  13.

  Bios-2

  “They may be lying through their teeth, but I don’t see any other option.” Melanie looked up from beneath her wide-brimmed straw hat, lined for solar protection, and gazed at Carrington standing in front of her with his fedora tilted back, trying to read him. They had been standing outside the Recreational Facility for quite a while, letting the shock of the brutal quadruple murder wear off. God knows they had seen their share of death firsthand; hell, she had taken a few lives on her own. But they deserved it, and she’d done it only to gain her freedom.

  At the root of the murders they saw today was evil: that same evil she had seen in Texas, then in Laramie, and now here. It was an evil that seemed to be in every man’s and woman’s heart. She felt that same evil when she took those lives. She remembered being shocked by the joy that came of taking revenge on those men who raped and imprisoned her. Oh, she’d seen evil in some of the men in this place. But it had rules to at least keep that in check. And by operating in community, they were working for a common purpose, a common good, rather than for selfish ends. Not so outside their walls, where that evil possessed everyone, like some sort of virus. And without accountability to God or the law, that virus turned men into monsters. Likewise, without the strong hand of Westerling, the same thing would happen here.

  She saw a couple of the scientists she was supposed to meet with right about then hurry by. One glanced at Melanie suspiciously, probably wondering why she wasn’t inside yet. “You and I might be able to survive out there, but the rest of the scientists, those who would follow us… I just don’t think so.” Melanie squeezed Carrington’s hand so tight hers was turning white under the long cuffs of her sun-protection robe.

  “Tell them to stay then.” He smiled a determined smile, as if the decision had been made. But that’s the way it was with Carrington; he would consider all the facts and when it was time, he would render a decision. Then he wouldn’t second-guess it, unless some new set of facts came in. That made him a rock for her and was one of the many reasons she loved him so much. “We’re together, and that’s most important. The world may crumble around us, but we’ll have each other. You need to go now and tell them your conclusion; they’re waiting for you.”

  She knew he was right. She had made her decision, too. It was the same as his: They would stay and survive.

  He kissed her softly but quickly, let go of her hand and walked away, knowing that she would procrastinate further if he stayed. She needed to convince them why her decision was best for everyone. But that also meant getting to the meeting in a timely fashion.

  “Carr?” Melanie pleaded. He looked back. “I love you,” she said before she marched into the lunchroom to try her best to convince them they had been all wrong—she and Carrington included—and now they needed to stay and be good servants to this community, even if Westerling was its leader. I should probably start with Rush, she reasoned; he was their go-to and had been for some time.

  Carrington had his own near-impossible job to do. He was now responsible for coming up with an alternate plan to generate enough energy to power this entire place because the current geothermal system was failing; the report Westerling had given him from his science staff confirmed this. But something didn’t feel right, and he needed more information to be able figure out why.

  Westerling would soon be expe
cting plans for an electrostatic generation plant that used all CME-induced current from the sun’s daily emissions. For whatever reason, their permanence was un-abating. He told her that he already knew what such a plant might look like, but it was reasonable for him to study what they had first so he could design around it. In truth, he wanted to see firsthand what was going on with Bios-2’s power generation, see why he felt something was… off. Maybe it was because he knew he had to go back into that room and deal with his vertigo. Maybe he was afraid of being caught. Whatever reason, he was nervous as hell about what he was going to do next.

  Carrington stood in the middle of the vast room and took it all in, from the ceiling and then back down. He followed the steam pipes from the open chamber, called the Shaft Room, where the steam came up from the geothermal reservoir through a filter system to the steam turbine in the middle of this room. Another set of pipes ran from the turbine and out, presumably to a condenser that cooled it, and then back down into the aquifer. He assumed the other room—the one he couldn’t see but pointed at yesterday—was for cooling. Except that it was guarded and locked up; this had to mean something. He walked in that direction.

  “Excuse me, you can’t be down here,” said a voice of authority from behind him. It was one of the guards.

  Carrington’s heart skipped a beat, but he took a breath and stated, “I’m Dr. Carrington Reid; Mr. Westerling has tasked me to work here on a project of his. I’m doing my research, under his authority.”

  “Wait here,” the guard commanded as he pulled out his portable and made a call.

  Within a few seconds, the guard was saying, “Yes sir, Mr. Gufstafson. I’ll tell him, sir. Thank you. Sir? Right now, my replacement won’t be down for shift change for another twenty minutes or so. Okay sir, I’ll be right there.” He stuck his radio back on his belt and said to Carrington, “You are cleared to do your work, Dr. Reid. You are welcome to go anywhere, except that room.” Of course, “that room” was the locked room Carrington was headed for. “I have to go topside, but my replacement will be here right away.” He trotted toward and then up the stairwell.

  Carrington waited, walking around the main turbine, pretending to examine it. While he did this, he watched to confirm when the lone guard was gone and to make sure no one else was watching. After the guard slipped out, Carrington dashed to the entrance of the mystery room—the one he wasn’t allowed to see.

  “So you’re giving in to them?” asked Sanchez. He was a bony computer nerd and not someone who would do well with cannibals lurking about.

  “I’m giving into our condition,” Melanie argued, trying to put as much passion as she could into what she said. But she hated politics, and she especially hated not being true to her heart; her heart said this was wrong because the people who ran this place were not good people. She tried to look at life as a math problem, and with math there was no wiggle room, although Carrington did a much better job of this. Her father said it best: “Life is what it is, and the rest is bullshit.” She explained to them that this facility was their best chance at survival while society didn’t exist outside of their walls and cannibals were allowed to run around unchecked. Furthermore, as long as the sun was bearing down on them so hard, killing the very cells of every living thing… All these factors made their decision pretty easy, even if they didn’t like it. They would all survive together or die apart.

  “Yeah, why are you singing a different tune now? Did you get something that you’re not telling us?” That was Babinski. He was a prick, although a damned brilliant prick.

  “Look, guys”—the only two women in the room looked at her sternly—“and gals. You didn’t see what we saw; we watched four men get murdered in public. No, executed. Their dead bodies are still tied to poles, on display. It was a message to their people as well as to us. But, it’s worse than that. From what I understand, their bodies will be gone by tomorrow morning, thanks to the many cannibals outside who will eat them…” She let this ferment with them. “Is that really the kind of place you’re desperate to go to?”

  A few heads shook.

  “Me neither. We’re not asking you to believe everything we’re being told, but I believe that Bios-2 is our best chance of survival. Westerling and Lunder and the rest need us as much as we need them.”

  “But how do we know that they will do what they say?” Babinski continued his rant.

  Melanie closed her eyes and hoped Carr was having more luck with his challenge.

  Carrington ran into a brick wall of a guard at the entrance of the mystery room: they were all physical specimens, but this man was a towering hulk who must have been fed a diet of only meat and steroids. He appeared strikingly like a certain green comic-book character, only a bit more flesh-toned.

  “This area is restricted,” said the guard, in a higher pitched voice than expected.

  “Oh, sorry. I’m Dr. Carrington Reid. I’m working on a project for Mr. Westerling. I need to get in here.”

  “Unless you get approval from Mr. Westerling and I have that approval in writing, you cannot go in there. No one is allowed in there,” he said, solid as the building around them.

  Another scientist in a lab coat walked past Carrington and said, “Hi, Harry. I’m just running a couple tests. I’ll be out in ten minutes.” He marched to the door’s thumbprint access panel. Almost as quickly as he put his thumb on the pad, the door clicked open and he breezed in like he was walking into the public dining area to get water.

  “No problem, Dr. Tenaka. We’ll see you in ten,” Harry said with a smile that morphed into a sneer when he glared back down at Dr. Reid.

  Carrington tried to remember Dr. Tenaka. That’s right, he thought. He’s a nuclear physicist who kept to himself mostly, and until now, Carrington had no idea where Tenaka worked. So, what was a nuclear physicist doing in a geothermal production plant? And why wasn’t Carrington asked to work with him? Something felt very wrong and he had to figure it out.

  “Dr. Reid?” Harry called.

  “Yes.”

  “If there’s nothing else, get back to work.”

  He had a plan, but he wanted to run it by Melanie first. It was very risky and he wanted to make sure she was okay with it. If his suspicions were correct, it would be worth the risk.

  “Yes, I’ll get that approval from Mr. Westerling.” He headed up the stairs, one step at a time. Each step lifted his level of anxiety.

  14.

  Cicada

  “Come in,” Max hollered at his front door. The pretense of this being his sanctuary was already gone. He downed the tequila, his first shot in many years, and felt it warm and burn his gut; it was the desired effect.

  The morning’s light burst through his front door, as if Helios crashed his chariot right there, setting fire to the earth and depositing Magdalena. She tentatively stepped in, with light appearing to seep from her pores.

  Halting momentarily at the pictures on the wall, just long enough for them to register, she was visible from the living room. “Max?” she called out, not seeing him.

  “Hi, Magdalena. I'm back here,” Max said softly from the murky rear of the room.

  “Why are you in the—”

  A click, and a rush of sunlight spilled from the blinds behind Max. He sat at a desk, empty except for a computer monitor on one side and a tequila bottle and a shot glass on the other.

  He rose, grabbed both bottle and glass and seized another glass from a bookshelf as he ambled over to her.

  As he plopped into one end of the living room couch, a cloud of dust billowed up like a thousand little pinpricks dancing in the beams of the morning light shooting through the open door. He cursed himself for not letting someone in to clean this place in the couple years since he had last been here. He beckoned her to the other end and poured tequila into both glasses.

  She accepted the glass. “Thanks, but—”

  Max held up his hand. “Please, just one toast.”

  “Okay, then what shall
we toast to?”

  “Safety, or being alive, or”—he thought for a moment—“or how about to you for making it here, or hell, I don't care, let's just have a drink.”

  “I didn't think you drank.”

  “I don't, but I found lots of good reasons to have one today.”

  “Okay, let's toast to safety then.” Magdalena extended her glass to Max's.

  “To safety.” He clinked her glass and drank his shot down in one gulp as she watched and took a sip. “It really is good to see you.” Max smiled and poured another drink and held out the bottle to her.

  She shook her head and took another small sip.

  They sat quietly and without any awkwardness. He studied her and immediately realized she was more beautiful than he had remembered when he came to her aid in Mexico; also, she was older. Maybe it was because she looked similar to his beloved Fatima, and he wanted her to be unattainable, and therefore too young. Plus, she had been on her way to Cicada and he was off to find the Kings. Or maybe it was just the stress of surviving the ongoing apocalypse that made her look older.

  But it wasn’t stress. Her face carried the visible signs of someone who was in her thirties, not barely twenty, as he had assumed. The delightful lines around her eyes and the soft contours around her lips were of a woman and not the girl he had told himself she was.

  Besides her age, Max had two revelations about Magdalena right then, sitting with her on his sofa. She didn’t really look like Fatima. Magdalena looked like her own person: strong, wise and beautiful in her own way. He also realized at that moment that he could love her.