New World Order

by S. M. McEachern

  But that was all about to change. Doc had just declared the pregnancy a healthy one.

  Using a damp towel, I washed off the ultrasound jelly and reached for my supersuit. A product of nanotechnology, each suit had been designed to work with the wearer’s DNA in what Doc called an intrinsic relationship. Although I would never pretend to understand just how they were engineered, Doc had said it often enough that I could recite it: using a molecular-sized hydraulic system powered by nanocrystal solar cells, the exoskeleton interacted with the wearer’s electrochemical impulses to enhance muscular strength, agility, and speed, and layers of nanoparticles gave the material shock-absorbing properties. I once marveled to Doc at the speed with which he came up with these suits, but he said the technology already existed in the computer banks and it was as easy as following a recipe. In fact, there was so much data on nanotechnology in the computer banks that Doc said he could never get through it all in his lifetime.

  I slipped into my exoskeleton, a sleek bodysuit with a high, loose-fitting collar that could be pulled up to protect my head and most of my face. Even though the garment was lightweight, it had excellent insulating capabilities and kept the wearer warm in cold weather and cool in hot. It was formfitting enough to be hidden under clothes, although I rarely wore it outside of Doc’s underground lab since he was adamant the technology remained secret. The suits were still being fine-tuned, so our small covert militia—a group of soldiers from the Pit with the sole purpose of defense against the bourge in the event of conflict—only wore them beyond the confines of Doc’s underground lab when taking them out to test their efficacy. Doc was a bit of a madman in his pursuit of perfection, always pushing the suit and wearer to their combined limits in order to make improvements. My mission to go find Jack would mark the first time an exoskeleton had been used in a real situation.

  I pulled my everyday clothes on over the suit and pushed aside the thin curtain that formed the only barrier between my examination room and the lab. The subterranean facility was well equipped but sparsely furnished, with only the necessities for personal comfort. Doc was sitting at his desk, the glow from his computer lighting his face with an unnatural luminosity in the dimly lit cavern. Between his government-backed research in genetics and his position on the Senate, Doc no longer practiced traditional medicine. I was his one exception, and that was only because the baby I carried could potentially have nanobots making up a portion of his DNA. I had to admit it scared me. Not only will my child be a half-breed in a society populated by bigots, but he might also be part engineered. Ultimately that was my fault, although I couldn’t find enough regret in my heart to feel guilty. If I were sent back in time right now, back to the day I used Doc’s cocktail to save Jack’s life, I wouldn’t change anything. In fact, I was running on the assumption that the microscopic robots were still doing their job and keeping my husband alive.

  Doc was completely absorbed in examining something and didn’t notice me entering the lab. I looked at whatever he was holding, unable to figure it out. It was there, and yet it wasn’t.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  Doc almost jumped out of his chair. “I didn’t hear you,” he said. He hit a key on his keyboard just as he opened a drawer underneath the tabletop and stuffed whatever he was holding into it.

  “What is that?” I repeated.

  His mouth was set in a firm line as he turned his attention to the computer monitor. “Here’s the first ultrasound picture.”

  “I just saw you holding something that looked like a... a... mirror? Only it wasn’t a mirror because it was flexible, like cloth. What was it?”

  The thin line of his lips pursed for a moment, and then he turned to face me. “I wasn’t quite ready to share it with anyone, but it’s my own fault for working on it while you’re around. I honestly became so engrossed I forgot you were here.” I didn’t take it as an insult. Doc was a bit of an absentminded scientist. “It’s called metamaterial. I found it in the memory banks a very long time ago and was intrigued. Admittedly, I am first and foremost a biologist, so it did require some study to understand transformation optics.”

  “English, Doc.”

  “A cloaking material. Invisibility,” he said.

  I eyed him. Invisibility? “For real?”

  He nodded.

  “Can I touch it?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t want it damaged. When it’s ready, I’ll share it with the team.” He pointed to the computer monitor and the ultrasound picture. “Everything looks fine.”

  I looked at the fuzzy white blobs intermingled with dark areas, apparently a picture of the baby. It looked as abstract as I felt.

  “I wish I could tell you with absolute certainty that the threatened miscarriage was just your body’s reaction to whatever that arrow had been tipped with and the worst is over, but the truth is, I don’t know for certain.”

  At the mention of the arrow, I instinctively touched my side. The wound was closed and leaving what promised to be a nasty scar. Whatever substance the recruiters had used on the projectile had put me to sleep for almost forty-eight hours. But the worst side effect had been all the bleeding. There had been so much blood that it was a miracle that I was still pregnant. Or perhaps this baby had inherited his daddy’s special DNA.

  Squinting, I peered closer at the screen, trying to discern anything that might even remotely look like a tiny human being. Maybe if I could see his face... Doc traced the outline of one of the white blobs. “This is the baby,” he said. I shook my head, still not seeing it, still not making that motherly connection. What was wrong with me? Doc shrugged. “It was an old ultrasound machine I found in a supply closet. I knew the bourge wouldn’t miss it.”

  Since Doc didn’t want the bourge finding out about his lab, all of his equipment was “borrowed.” In the confusion of post-liberation, when equipment had been transferred out of the Dome to new facilities, it had been easy to redirect inventory.

  “Can you tell by that picture if it’s... infected with nanobots?” I felt squeamish just saying it out loud.

  Doc’s face broke into a rare smile. “Infected?”

  I smiled tightly as I fought the urge to snap at him. I had been under enough stress lately and could do without being made to feel like an idiot.

  “Molecular nanotechnology isn’t a biological invasion. I used Kenner’s own DNA to design molecules to repair tissue damage and fight off infection. Since they are capable of self-replicating, it’s a possibility that they could be passed to offspring.” He turned the monitor back to face him. “Unfortunately, only the blueprints for the technology were saved in the data banks, so there are no records of the outcomes or how widely used nanotech was before the War. Consequently, I don’t know if the molecules are capable of becoming a genetic trait.”

  “So if the baby has inherited them, it wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing?”

  “Not a bad thing at all. If I can perfect this technology, then mortality rates will be greatly reduced.” His eyes shifted away from the monitor to look at me. “And I currently only have two test subjects: Jack Kenner and his baby. Since one is missing, I have a vested interest in preserving the other. If you can make it to twelve or thirteen weeks, your chances of a successful pregnancy increase significantly.”

  “Twelve or thirteen weeks?” I echoed. Why did everything have to be so complicated? “But I’m only nine weeks, and Jack’s trail is getting cold.”

  Doc regarded me with an understanding, if not tolerant, expression. “Others have been out searching and they’ve found no sign of them. I don’t know why you think you’ll have better luck.”

  “I’ll be with people who know their way around,” I said. “Now that the ice on the river is broken up, the Nation will begin their own search tomorrow. They have a guide, a former recruit who found refuge with the Nation fifteen years ago. He says he stumbled upon the Nation when he followed a river from Ryder’s city, and he’s pretty sure he can find the
city again. I’m going with them, and Summer’s coming with me too.” I paused for a moment, knowing how protective Doc was about his technology. “And we plan on wearing our supersuits. I know you’ve said a thousand and one times not to reveal their existence because ‘it’s our advantage over the bourge,’” I said, making air quotes. “But at some point we actually need to test the suits in a real-life situation. And what better time than when we’re not with the bourge?”

  Doc let out a disgruntled huff. “First, how many times do I have to tell you it’s an exoskeleton and not some cartoonish hero outfit? Second, if I can’t talk you out of going, then I want you to wear it. It’ll give you and Kenner’s offspring extra protection.”

  I snapped my head in his direction. “Kenner’s offspring?”

  His expression turned to confusion and then transformed to horror. “It’s not someone else’s, is it?”

  “No!” I said incredulously. “It’s just...God, Doc, it’s a baby, not an experiment.”

  He seemed to be at a loss for a moment and then slowly understanding crossed his face. “So it is his child, and I was just being insensitive,” he said. I nodded and he let out a sigh of relief.

  I still wasn’t used to Doc’s clinical demeanor, despite all the time we had spent together over the past ten months. As his handpicked leader for his techno-elite army in the rough, my time had been divided between this lab and my studies at the Academy. It had been a struggle, highlighted by the occasional meltdown where I may have said once or twice, “I quit!” Not to mention that at least half of the militia was made up of my friends, which really put me in an awkward leadership role.

  Yet there was something about Doc that touched my heart. Yeah, he was socially impaired, but maybe that’s why I felt the way I did about him. Having an IQ too high to be measured had earned him a life as a scientist in a bourge lab, isolated from his own kind, imprisoned by the threat that his infant son and wife would be executed if he didn’t do what he was told. He spent the next thirty years working in seclusion, and it had done things to his mind. Although his wife had been Culled when she reached the age of thirty-five, I found out his son was still alive and had a wife and daughter. Despite my urgings, Doc couldn’t bring himself to make contact. His son thought he was long dead, and in Doc’s opinion that was better than the truth.

  Doc brought up a new ultrasound picture on the screen, which looked just as abstract as the first. “I was hoping to entice you to stay because your services may be required,” he said as he studied the picture. I noticed him peek quickly at me out of the corner of his eye.

  “Is this about Leisel Holt?” I asked. He looked surprised that I knew. “Bron came to visit me. She said that Malcolm West brought Leisel in to take Jack’s seat in the Senate until Jack was either found or declared dead and a new election could be held.”

  Doc leaned back in his seat and studied me for a moment. “So what are you going to do about it?”

  My eyebrows shot up. “Me?”

  “You are the leader of our militia. A strategic strike would serve us well right now.”

  As the meaning of his suggestion sank in, my mouth fell open. “You mean assassinate someone?” I searched his eyes, hoping to see a shocked response, but his expression confirmed my guess. “That’s an act of war. We kill one of them, they kill lots of us.”

  “We’re not defenseless anymore. Maybe it’s time to give them a show of force.”

  I almost laughed. For the past ten months a lot of my time had been spent learning the art of combat: through my studies at the Academy, which included two hours of martial arts and one hour of weapons training every day, and my time with the Nation, where I was immersed in martial arts, archery, and learning a form of meditation that aided me in memorizing each movement. And I considered myself still very much a student, not a master. Doc was expecting a miracle if he thought I had enough skill to whip an untrained militia into shape.

  “The only advantage we have is our supersuits, but we still need to learn how to use them,” I said. “We’re not ready, Doc, and even if we were, killing is a last resort. I’m counting on our senators—you, David Chavez, and Martin Kenner—to block West. I mean, you were elected to look after our interests, right? And West has zero authority to bring Leisel in to claim Jack’s seat.” My words were harsh, and with anyone else I might have felt a little bad saying them, but I had never known Doc to be one for niceties.

  “West is trying to twist the wording of our draft constitution, arguing that there’s a grandfather clause that gives the Holt family permanent presence in the government, no matter how that government is organized.”

  “Please,” I said, with dry sarcasm. “No one’s going to accept that. It’s beyond ridiculous.”

  Doc sat up straighter. “Guess again. Powell’s backing him, and they had the House packed with supporters of the old regime. In fact, West took advantage of the situation to make a few grandstanding speeches against your husband’s politics, calling his move to eradicate the credit system communist in nature. He said fiscal policy is needed to stimulate growth and—get this—to keep freeloaders from developing in our society. Remind you of anything?”

  That had my attention. The credit system was a relic of the treaty. A tool that worked in tandem with education to ensure the rich stayed rich, the poor stayed poor, and the slaves remained enslaved. We were constantly reminded in the Pit that freeloaders weren’t tolerated. If peace was ever going to be achieved, the credit system had to go.

  “Both the Pit and the Alliance are against keeping it, and together we far outnumber the old regime,” I said. “West won’t get away with it.”

  “The Alliance?” Doc huffed. “Where were they last week when the riot broke out at the Employment Center? People died, Miss O’Donnell.”

  I shrank away from the vengeance I saw in his eyes. “I didn’t know there was a riot,” I said. “What happened?”

  “Applications for the new coalmine were being accepted, and despite a lineup of applicants that ran two city blocks—the vast majority of whom had dark eyes—over ninety percent hired were bourge. Only a handful of experienced miners from the Pit were given jobs, and the only reason they were hired was to train the bourge how to mine!” One of Doc’s hands curled into a tight fist. “West and Powell have defended the Employment Center, stating that level of education has always been a more important qualification than experience.”

  I shook my head in utter bewilderment. “What? If that’s true, then why weren’t the miners in the Pit given more education under bourge rules?”

  “Under the terms of the treaty, the Pit operated under different rules. Now that the treaty is no longer in place, West and Powell are arguing that we all play by Dome laws.”

  “But Jack’s campaign to change the laws to reflect liberation has received public approval.”

  “It doesn’t take a lot of people to corrupt an organization. It just takes a few people in strategic positions. The ones doing the hiring were West supporters, and any bourge lucky enough to get a paying job wasn’t going to jeopardize it by sticking up for a bunch of urchins.”

  Closing my eyes, I pinched the skin on the bridge of my nose hoping it might alleviate the headache I could feel coming on. “Why didn’t anyone tell me about the riot?”

  “It happened the same day you were shot by that arrow, and you’ve been a little preoccupied since.” I opened my mouth to speak in my own defense, but Doc brushed me away with a wave of his hand. “I’m not blaming you. You’ve had quite a week. And as you’ve pointed out, it’s the job of our senators to represent our interests in government. I just wanted you to know that Senator Chavez and I did our due diligence and demanded answers from West about the riot in the last Senate meeting.”

  Frustrated, I drew in a deep breath and blew it out. It all just made finding Jack that much more of a priority.

  “What about Jack’s father? What does he have to say about all this?” I asked. I was still tryin
g to figure out Martin Kenner. He had dropped by our house a number of times over the past ten months, usually after a Senate meeting on his way home to his suites in the Dome. Although he always had a few polite words to say to me, actual conversation was reserved for his sons.

  Doc shrugged. “Martin Kenner rarely speaks out, but he’s a bourge, so I’m left to assume he’s pro-West.”

  I wished I could claim that wasn’t true, but I honestly had no idea where Martin’s loyalties lay. The Kenners had always been the head of Liberty—an organization with the goal of taking down the Holt regime and restoring democracy. But after some of the conversations I had overheard, it seemed to me that Jack’s parents’ idea of “restoring democracy” was synonymous with one of their sons taking over as sole president. They hadn’t really declared how they felt about Liberty uniting with the Pit to form the Alliance.

  “All the more reason for me to find Jack and bring him home. In the meantime, fight fire with fire and rally the Alliance for the next Senate meeting. The House is where this fight should be fought—using words, not weapons.” A wave of revulsion washed over me at the memory of our last conflict with the bourge. Far too many people paid with their lives to achieve freedom, but at least I could put the blame on a crazed dictator. We didn’t have that excuse this time around.

  Doc opened his mouth to say something, seemed to reconsider, and closed it, his face set in disappointment.

  A buzzing filled the cavern, making both of us jump. Doc reached out and pressed a key on his computer. A picture of Reyes Crowe, standing at the door of the lab, loomed up on the screen.

  “What’s he doing here?” I asked. “Is the militia scheduled for testing tonight?”