Future Retold

by Daniel Pierce

  6

  Three hours later, I stood watching six kids climb all over the dead Cleaner like it was playground equipment.

  “They don’t fear it,” I told Beba, who just smiled. I was now clothed, at least somewhat, leaving my shirt off as my skin tried to heal.

  “Why would they? Jack killed it, and we’re here to do, what, exactly?” she asked, her eyes brown eyes twinkling with merriment. In her mid-fifties, her olive skin was free of wrinkles, and dark hair just streaked with gray.

  “How are you smiling with this stink?” I asked her.

  “I ran a daycare,” she answered simply.

  “Ahh. Say no more.”

  “Why did we come? You have something in mind, I think,” Beba asked.

  Breslin stood next to the Cleaner, neck craned up to take all of it in. He was shaking his head in awe.

  “Let me show you something,” I said, walking her to the place where I’d removed the armor plating. The clumps of fat were drying in the sun but still jiggly to the touch. “What do you make of that?”

  She leaned close, sniffing, then touched a yellow lump with her fingertip. Then she tasted it, and her eyebrows went up. “I see what you mean.” With a piercing whistle, she summoned the kids then pointed to the truck and shouted for barrels and baskets. Turning back to me, her smile was wide and joyous. “I know exactly what to do with this.”

  “I was hoping you’d say that. I can think of a few things it might be used for, but the first thing that came to mind was—”

  “Soap. And a lot of it,” Beba finished for me.

  “You read my mind. We need oils and lubricants, too.”

  Breslin had come close enough to hear our conversation. “I smelled oil to the south, thought the same thing. We have plenty of power. What we don’t have is oils and cleaning fluids, things like that.”

  “Add that to the list. I’ll ask Aristine if she has overlay maps of oil and gas deposits. In my time, this was oil country,” I said.

  “Still is, going by the smell,” Breslin said, then cast a gimlet eye at the Cleaner. “Away from this thing, I mean.”

  “I know. You should have smelled it when it was leaking.” I shuddered. “Not anything I want to repeat.”

  “Were you burned?” he asked. Beba took my arm in her hands and began examining my skin.

  “Digestive fluid. Coated me after I opened the beast up a couple times. My ‘bots are healing, but it will be a day or so,” I admitted.

  “That’s disgusting. And I say that as a man with many children, who has seen some things. Terrible things,” Breslin added, winking.

  “I’m coming to appreciate that kind of immunity to smells,” I said with a laugh.

  “Kids! Barrels here, if you please.” Beba’s voice rang with authority. The children began to line up, rolling and carrying all manner of containers to the edge of the Cleaner’s body. “If you’ll do the honors, gentlemen?”

  “Of course,” I said. I walked to the nearest armor plate, stuck my sword under it, and pried hard. With the telltale sound of tearing flesh, the plate came free—easier than the first, likely due to the beast starting to decompose in the hot sun. I doubled my efforts and began popping armor free, letting the plates fall to the ground where a kid would haul it away like a sled. We were taking the armor, too—I had plans for it, and the fat was only one element of the giant creature we were going to use.

  Beba was a wizard with her chosen tool—a soup ladle, which she wielded with unerring aim, scooping the lumps of fat into barrels until they were bulging and too heavy to move.

  Breslin stepped in then, lifting the barrels with a mighty heave, his enormous muscles straining. He carried the full containers to the truck at a careful pace, sliding them across the bed and cinching each with lengths of rope.

  “We’re going to have more than we need,” Beba said.

  “Take what you can. As to the armor, we can stack it on top of the truck, too. All we can hold. We’ll pack both trucks, and the four-wheelers can hold stacks tied to the back, with two kids on each for balance. We’ll get a lot of this back home,” I said.

  “Home. First time I’ve heard you say that,” Andi said, slipping her arm around me. “Need anything else from us, Beba?”

  “No, the kids are on it. I promised them pies tonight if they cleaned this creature to the bones. Not that it has bones, necessarily, but they don’t need to know that,” Beba said.

  “Then let’s finish the beastie off and get going. At some point, we won’t be the only things crawling all over the corpse,” I said. With a stench of this magnitude, it was a matter of time before scavengers showed up, and I didn’t need gunfire around an army of kids.

  “Almost done,” Beba called, then began rousting the final children along with their loads. In minutes, every vehicle was loaded with pilfered Cleaner parts, kids, and armor plates.

  “We’re ready,” Breslin said.

  As a column, we began to snake back home, leaving the hulking beast behind us. Before we had gone a hundred meters, the shadows of blood chickens began to swirl on the ground as the scavengers found their bounty. The first bird that landed dipped its beak in the stinking flesh, shrieking in defiance at anything and everything that would challenge its position.

  It was a tough world, and we would have to be toughest of all if we were going to survive.

  7

  My legs were stretched out toward the firepit when the hooded figure sat down next to me, getting comfortable.

  “Aren’t you going to offer me a drink?” Aristine said, pulling her cloak back to reveal her beautiful features. Her blonde hair spilled free and she wore a broad smile in the firelight, blue eyes twinkling with mischief at her unexpected arrival.

  “I will. After I discipline the guards for letting you through,” I said, sighing.

  “Don’t be cross. One of the guards was speaking to Breslin, who—”

  “Is now, ah, chatting with Yulin, no doubt,” I finished. Breslin and Aristine’s sister had a relationship that was passing through casual into something more.

  “Something like that, yes,” she admitted with a rich ripple of laughter. Her voice was as beautiful as the rest of her. She crossed her long legs in an imitation of my relaxed pose, though her uniform was red and blue and her boots were made for life in the Chain.

  I looked up at the stars, letting my head fall back. Andi and Mira were asleep, and Silk was taking a bath, her long day finally concluded. I was alone under the crescent moon and night sky, or had been until the first general of the Eden Chain joined me wearing a conspiratorial smile.

  “I take it this isn’t a booty call?” I asked.

  “Booty call? Is that an archaic term for what Yulin is no doubt engaging in at this moment?” she asked, her brow lifted in mock horror.

  “One and the same. Quite acceptable in my society, and no doubt yours, too,” I added with a hopeful leer.

  She laughed again then leaned forward and kissed my cheek. “Sadly, I come to you for a direct report, but not the kind you’re hoping for, though if your women stay away for much longer . . .” She let the sentence trail off with her own smirk.

  “Business first, General. Why couldn’t you call? Not that I’m not glad to see you,” I added.

  Her face grew serious. “Because of this,” she said. From her travel bag she produced a small object, melted to slag on one side and smelling of chemicals. She put it in my hand, nodding toward me that it was okay to handle despite the scent. Under the firelight, I could see a metal housing, an odd ceramic, and a single blue wire, now scorched black on the end. A socket of some kind was melted beyond recognition, and the thing was heavy for its size, weighing at least five kilos.

  “What was it before it, ah, imploded?” I asked.

  “What an excellent term, because that’s closer to the truth than you realize. It was a fairly sophisticated attempt to do something we—that is, the Eden Chain—have only now decided to pursue, thanks to our new
neighbors.” She smiled, inclining her head to me, and said, “That would be you.”

  “A battery?” I guessed, looking the thing over once more.

  “Yes, but not anything that should exist outside of the Chain, as far as we can tell. Someone was trying to house a tiny system that would deliver a huge punch. A mobile level of power that could be used for almost anything,” Aristine said.

  “You mean military applications?” I asked her.

  “Among other things, yes, but it could only be done with nanobots and access to pocket reactors. Without those things, this”—she waved at the battery—“doesn’t exist.”

  “Which means someone is tinkering with ‘bots and fusion, and they’re close to success.”

  Aristine shook her head. “No, it means they’re close to failure, and that’s what has me worried. There are no limits to the damage they can do with attempts like this. New strains of nanobots are one thing, but an unchecked reaction? That’s a threat we can’t allow. Not after how far we’ve come, and how much you’re doing out here. For the first time in two thousand years, we have a chance to come out of the dark. We can’t let that be taken away from us by some backyard scientist who doesn’t understand what they’re playing with.”

  “Nukes? Wait, nukes and ‘bots? And you say you’re working on the same thing?” I asked her, a note of disbelief in my voice. Aristine was brilliant, and her people were as well, but I had to know if she was worried about the potential for destruction. We were so close to living again, instead of just surviving.

  She tilted her head, then nodded slowly. “I didn’t come here to scare the hell out of you and then go back to safety. I have news and a—think of it as a request that may lead to something worth our time. Something we need to do, as a unified people.”

  “Tell me.” I knew she wouldn’t ask me anything she was not willing to do herself. It was one of the reasons she was an excellent leader.

  She took her tablet out, thumbing the screen to life with a soft glow. On it, I saw a simple map, with The Oasis, Cache, and Chain clearly marked. To the south of us were a series of small dots, and a river running east to west. She tapped the screen with a long finger. “Our population is growing drastically for the first time in centuries. That means we need to increase the production of tech.”

  “I never asked you, but where do you build it? The high end stuff?” I said.

  “The forges. Three-dimensional printing systems in E5, but they need raw materials to run, and our resources won’t be able to keep up with what comes next for us as a people,” Aristine admitted.

  “And there are—mines? To the south?”

  “Mines are something we can access from underground, and safely. This is something else. This is oil,” she said, pointing to the spray of black dots across the map.

  I slapped my forehead, feeling dumb. “Of course. I should have known. That’s—well, that was oil country in my time, too. For two hundred years it produced oil and gas.”

  “The satellite data shows oil is accessible at the surface level, as well as huge deposits still untouched in domes here, here, and all through here,” she said, pointing to shaded areas that covered huge sections of what used to be Oklahoma and Texas. “That’s what we need, and if we have to, I’ll send troops to secure the sites, but I need you, Jack. I need your eyes and ears, and we need Mira and Andi, too. Whoever you have, we need them, because the distance is too far for a pipeline. Yet.”

  “Yet?” I asked, noting her half-smile. “What will change?”

  She came close enough that I could smell the pines in her hair, smiling slowly. “You’re going to have to visit the Chain to find that out.”

  “Seems like an elaborate excuse just to get me alone, General,” I said, acting wounded.

  “Oh, I could do that easily enough. This visit will serve two purposes.”

  “Which are?” I asked.

  She kissed me, and her smile grew even wider. “In your day, I believe you called them business and pleasure.”

  8

  I stepped inside the Eden Chain entry point a few hours later, having left the women in charge with orders to contact me if anything larger than a housecat attacked us. I was unnerved by the Cleaner, even though we’d managed to dispatch the giant creature without taking casualties other my own case of chemically induced sunburn. Our trip had been uneventful to the point of tedium, but the night sky changing to a robust dawn had been a sight to see. At one point, a massive flock of unknown birds had winged past, their deep green feathers shining like emeralds in the early morning sunshine.

  “Something new?” I asked, pointing to the birds.

  Yulin frowned, but Aristine shook her head after a long look. “I think you called them flamingos in your time, but they’re a different color now, and a lot bigger. They turn green from eating river plankton, and we’ve seen a huge rookery of them on satellite to the east. There are hot springs that way, and those birds build nests as high as my head. I’ve only seen aerial data, but there are thousands.”

  “They must be almost two meters long,” I said in amazement. Their wings looked like a glider, with brilliant green plumage that faded to white at the tips. By some unseen signal, the entire flock wheeled right, speeding away like a single, connected organism.

  “Easily. I’d like to see one up close some time. They’re one of the rare things that doesn’t look like it will eat us,” Yulin said.

  All I could do was grunt in agreement, because she was right. It was a hard world, and every animal competed with every other animal for a place at the top.

  We rolled on as the sand turned to grasses and then the telltale sign of the Chain. The trees were still vibrant, and we pulled in to a different entrance that I’d not seen before. There was room for the vehicle, as well as enough people to defend the position in case of an assault. We got out, stretched, and let our eyes adjust to the relative darkness. The air was still and warm.

  “Welcome back,” Aristine said as Yulin went ahead of us. She looked curiously satisfied for a woman who had traveled for half a day on no sleep.

  “Yulin, I—” I said, but she held up a hand.

  “Not a word. I’m going to bed. You can taunt me later,” she said, fighting a huge yawn.

  I inclined my head politely. “Fair enough. Permission to make lewd jokes after you rest?”

  “Permission granted, if you must,” Yulin said as the doors closed, and we made our way into the interior.

  Once inside, I took my first deep breath of the rich, cool air that smelled of forest and life. It was a stunning difference from the harsh reality of The Empty, and my ears quickly attuned to the noise of distant water, calling birds, and an angry squirrel somewhere below. The trees spread out before me in stately elegance, leaves spread wide to catch the low light emanating from the endless small sources overhead. It felt homey and right to be there, looking down on an oasis that had existed for twenty centuries.

  “I’m off,” Yulin said without fanfare, waving as she descended the steps with ringing impacts. In seconds she was gone from our sight, leaving us to stand overlooking the spread of E1. A man in engineer’s coveralls waved from a nearby walkway that connected three massive trees, then he too was gone.

  “Sleep first, then food, then we discuss the future. There’s a lot to see, Jack,” Aristine said, and there was genuine excitement in her voice despite the obvious exhaustion.

  “I’m ready. To your place first, and then let’s see what you have in store for rebuilding the future.”

  Moments later, we descended on her bed, and I groaned at the luxury of it all. “I’d forgotten what an actual mattress feels like. It’s like I’ve been sleeping on horse blankets.”

  “I have some horse blankets available, if you feel like punishing yourself,” Aristine said, grinning over her shoulder as she began to undress. Her red and blue uniform was made for two purposes; the first being combat comfort and the second being a sense of dignity. She was, after al
l, the First General, which meant she had to look and play the part of a fearless leader. I unlaced my boots and began to strip but found myself hesitating as each piece of Aristine’s clothing came away, exposing an expanse of flawless skin. She was pale, and toned, and tall and lean, her breasts an astounding sight that she covered with her unbound hair, rolling her neck and shoulders to loosen muscles gone stiff from our ride. When she glanced back at me, her smile was luminous.

  “You are perfect,” I said, because she was and there was nothing else to be said. I saw her blue eyes go round with pleasure, and then she slid under the sheets, folding one corner back as an invitation.

  “You are too, and you are also”—she patted the bed—“not in this bed.”

  I said nothing but joined her like any sane man would. She reached for me, and we pulled each other close, our faces inches apart.

  “I’m glad to be here,” I said, then kissed her.

  She smiled and ran a finger along the edge of my jaw. Her touch was electric. “Do you think you’re ready for what’s coming? The changes?” she asked.

  “The monsters? The changes? The enormity of trying to rebuild something from my memory and hoping I don’t destroy the good things around me in the process by guessing wrong?”

  “You don’t guess, Jack. Neither do I. We’re not built like that. We watch, and think about what’s right, and what’s effective, and then we act. That’s why you’re here in my bed right now. Because you’re the kind of man who might be able to deal with responsibilities that are only going to get greater with each passing day. And your lifespan will have a lot to do with that,” she said.

  “More life means more problems?”

  “Among other things, but yes. You’re going to live long enough to know if you’ve succeeded, and that’s a heavy burden. The choices you make will resonate with the people you care about, and people you’ve never even met. Even my people will have to live with your choices.”

  “Your people? Why? Your autonomy isn’t in question,” I assured her.