by Samuel Fort
Chapter 48 - Sparks
Steepleguard had several turrets that climbed six stories into the air, each of which housed what Ben dubbed ‘Vegas Suites.’ He, Lilian and Fiela occupied one of these turrets and negotiations were underway as to who would occupy the others, though there was little doubt it would be the highest-ranking nobility present, as well as Disparthian. Ruffling a few feathers, he used his authority as Anax, which still felt pretty damn silly, to appropriate one of the turrets for use as a temporary command center. This particular turret offered excellent views of the surrounding country and elevations suitable for the placement of HF, VHF, UHF, and satellite antennas.
As a result of Ridley’s forethought, there were a number of electrical engineers and communication specialists among the Nisirtu present at Steepleguard. To Ben’s surprise, Lord Disparthian had a PhD in Telecommunications Engineering, so he put the Peth lord in charge of assembling the command center, telling him that he wanted at least twenty large high-definition monitors removed from the guest quarters and placed on the walls of the appropriated suite. Ten of the monitors were to be tuned to television news broadcasts while the other ten would display the home pages of what he considered the most reliable internet news sites. Ben further required that police scanners and military-grade receivers be brought to the turret and that Peth be assigned to monitoring local and HAM radio traffic.
Disparthian had strongly recommended that any radios and electronics not immediately needed be kept in the cave in one of the armored rooms to preserve them against the anticipated Electromagnetic Pulses, pointing out that all equipment in the command center would be put permanently out of commission once the EMP hit. Ben had agreed, and further directed that all electronics of value in the hotel be moved to the cave and similarly protected. Televisions were of dubious value but computers would still be needed, as would far simpler items, such microwave ovens and even stereos.
The new king also ordered that a team of Disparthian’s choosing be assigned to record and timestamp, in journals, events as they unfolded. Paper journals. Ben planned to compare what was observed to what the scripts called for and check for any discrepancies. If asked why he was doing this, he wouldn’t have been able to provide an answer, but his instincts were that at some point in the future the analysis would be of value. He would at least have a written record for posterity of the events that occurred the day humanity was pushed into the abyss.
After inspecting a map of the local area, Ben and the Peth had identified the best locations for roadblocks, bunkers, and observation towers. Knowing they would probably not be operational after the EMP attacks, all cars, vans, and small trucks were being placed at strategic points on the roads leading to Steepleguard. The vehicles would not fully block the roads but would force anyone approaching the hotel to zigzag between them in full view of distant observation points. The semi-trailers would be used by sentries to eat, sleep, and store weapons and ammunition at in remote locations. One had been sent to the park where Ben had picnicked with Lilian and Fiela just days ago. The overlook was an ideal position for an observation post.
Once a vehicle was put in place, a record was made of what kind of fuel it used and how much remained in its tank. Some of the fuel would work in the high-tech, EMP shielded generators that partially powered Steepleguard and the remainder might be needed for other purposes. Having an accurate record of available resources would, thought Ben, be vital in the months ahead.
“Anax,” said Disparthian, returning to the command center after a prolonged absence, “the praetors of Moros and Nizrok have arrived.”
Ben was sitting in a folding chair that faced the door, smoking a cigar. Disparthian’s men had found a box of them in the car with Nizrok’s corpse earlier that morning. Both Nizrok’s and Moro’s bodies were lying on steel shelves in the cave’s small mortuary. The smokes were unmarked but they were maduros and had the taste and pull of really good Cuban cigars. The new king had cut down on his cigar habit over the past year but the end of civilization seemed a worthy excuse to light one up.
“You’ve shown them the corpses and explained the situation?” he asked.
“Yes, and five of the praetors acknowledge my authority as Supreme Lord of Peth-Allati. They have already issued orders that all their troops immediately embark for Steepleguard.”
“How many will make it?”
Disparthian shook his head. “Perhaps half will make it here before the collapse. Some are at very remote locations. There is no script for this movement and international tensions are high. There is talk of war around the globe and many areas are quarantined because of Cage’s disease. All but the largest airports are closed.”
“So five legions are committed, but only half will make it here. That’s twenty-five hundred soldiers, if we’re lucky. Yours are on the way?”
“Yes, Anax. They will be here before nightfall. I had to delay their movement as long as possible, to avoid raising Moros’s suspicions, but each started their journey yesterday afternoon, and more importantly, their movements were scripted, so there will be no obstacles.”
The researcher considered this. “That gives us seventy-five hundred men. We’re going to have to find a place to house them.”
“I already have scouts exploring options, Anax.”
“Good,” said Ben, though he was also worried about feeding the new arrivals. He’d have to do the math later and see how long the cave’s rations would last with that many mouths to feed. He said, “What about the other five praetors, the ones who will not commit?”
“They demand to communicate with their kingdoms for orders.”
“Well, that’s no good. I doubt the other Houses will give up their armies voluntarily.”
Nodding, Disparthian said, “If you permit it, Anax, I will release them.”
“Do you think that’s smart? If they aren’t our friends, I have to assume they are our enemies. Or will be.”
“Perhaps, but they are not being unreasonable. I do not wish to condemn them for their masters’ sins against us. They are praetors, Anax. I know many of them and they are good and honorable men and women. That they would seek their regents’ guidance before joining a rogue kingdom is understandable.”
Ben laughed. “A rogue kingdom. Is that what we are?”
“For now.”
Ben drew on the cigar and watched the smoke dance as he exhaled. “Detain them until three o’clock and then have them taken back to Denver. That will give them four hours to contact their Families. That won’t be enough time for them to act against us, will it?”
The Peth shook his head. “No. It will take longer than that for the Families to decide what to do, and even if they issued orders for the praetors to summon their legions and march on Steepleguard, it would be impossible, logistically, for them to get here before the collapse. The Peth are spread across the globe. In theory, those in North and South America might make it here, eventually, but not as an organized army, and by then I think it more likely than not that they would join us instead of fighting us.”
“Good. Where are these courts, anyway? I mean, where are the kings and queens actually seated? Where do the scribes do their work?”
“They move frequently, Anax. The world is their kingdom, after all. But most recently, Moros’s Family held court in Morocco and Nizrok’s in Warsaw, Poland.”
“Yours?”
Disparthian gave him a curious look. “Here, Anax. My king and queen are seated here.”
Ben took a moment to step out onto the high balcony that floated on the edge of the turret. He breathed in the fresh mountain air and marveled that for the first time in almost a week the skies were a pure, crystal blue. It seemed wrong that it should be so, given what would happen later that day, but he reminded himself that weather was a local event and while the skies had cleared over the Rockies the storms Steepleguard had endured were now hitting the Midwest.
As he admired the mountains an
d meditated on what needed to be done, Lilian appeared next to him. She was wearing a white mink jacket over a dress that appeared to have been spun from gold. There was a bandage on her lower jaw, the flesh around it a dull purple.
“Good morning, Mutu,” she said, rising on her toes to kiss his cheek. “You appear to be making good progress.”
“Yeah, I think we’ll be ready by this evening.” He lifted her chin. “So, you’re minus a tooth?”
She nodded. “It wasn’t a challenge for the dentist. It practically jumped out of my mouth. He said everything else looks fine. It was, at least, a back tooth.”
“You’re feeling okay, then?”
“Yes. I’m very well.” Looking into the command center, she said, “I will have dinner sent to you and your team.”
“You don’t plan to be here? I thought that you would want to witness…you know. The end.”
“No. I want to focus on the future. I will leave this to you and Diz.”
Diz. That was what Lilian called Disparthian, Ben had learned. He wondered whether the man’s other acquaintances called him that or whether it was a more intimate nickname, mindful of the fact that Disparthian had come to Lilian’s aid the evening before. How old was their alliance, exactly, and was it merely strategic?
“What do you have planned?” he asked.
“Do not think me evil,” she answered, “but I think I shall arrange for some music in the ballroom.”
“Music? Tonight?”
“Tonight, yes. I’m sure you think it is ghoulish, but it will give the residents of Steepleguard something to do other than stew on what is going on in the outside world. Remember, they did not plan the approaching cataclysm. They have friends and family who will die in the days to come. They have lost their homes and live here as guests. You have busied yourself here and so will not have noticed that the mood is quite somber below. The children sense this melancholy and are growing afraid.”
Ben hadn’t thought of that. The fact was that among Steepleguard’s four hundred or so residents there were at least a hundred children of various ages already traumatized by the attack on the hotel. The fetches, too - he had given up on calling them servants, since no one else did - were in shock.
Earlier that morning Ben had told the Ardoon workers who had come to Steepleguard for the reception that the roads to and from the hotel were blocked by National Guard troops pending an investigation of the previous night’s attack, which he hinted were the actions of a drug cartel. No one could leave Steepleguard unless given special permission to do so by the Governor.
He took the lie a step further by claiming he had worked out a deal with said Governor to fly any immediate family from Denver or nearby cities to Steepleguard, free of charge, to wait out the investigation, assuring all the stranded workers that they would be compensated for lost wages.
It was a fiction that would not hold up to close scrutiny but it was the best he could do on such short notice. He wanted to save as many of the workers and their families as possible from what was coming and toward that end he was gratified to learn that many of them had accepted his offer. Even now, a helicopter was landing on the helipad with two additional families aboard. Eight had arrived since sunrise. Tonight, if any of the workers demanded to be returned home, he would grudgingly accommodate them.
He had also dispatched a team of four Peth to Denver to collect a small group of friends and associates and their families. He had called each of them personally and offered a variety of enticements, to include money, fame, and some more sordid things he wasn’t proud of. Most seemed reluctant to travel to Steepleguard on such short notice. It might be able to recover them after the collapse, of course, but doing so would be far more difficult.
Tomorrow, Steepleguard would be locked down.
“You’re right,” he said. “Better that we give them something else to focus on. What about Fiela?”
Lilian grunted. “She keeps trying to get out of bed. She claims she feels no pain and accuses the physicians of drugging her for unspecified but nefarious purposes. She has made veiled threats against them and they are, understandably, nervous. A scalpel is unaccounted for.”
Ben snorted a laugh. “I’ll go talk to her.”
“Thank you, Mutu. She is demanding to come here to the command center but the doctors say that the stress of this day’s events would be too much for her. They will, however, allow her to attend my performance tonight on condition that she remains seated in a wheelchair.”
“Even that’s incredible. Last night she was fighting for her life!”
“Peth are incredibly resilient, physically. Fiela more so than any other. She once dragged herself five miles to a safe house in some Eastern European country only to fall dead right at the doorstep. There was hardly any blood left in her, according to the medic who attended her.”
Ben grimaced. “What happened?”
“Both her legs were broken, one in two places, and she’d been stabbed in the stomach. I don’t recall all the details but it had something to do with a fight on top of a building that became a fight at the bottom of a building. Her opponent did not fare as well.”
“Good Lord!”
“Yes, but she was revived and walking again in three weeks.”
The man looked at her disbelievingly. “That’s not possible, Lilian.”
“Fiela’s a very special girl,” the woman said, looking at him earnestly. It appeared she might say something else but she instead turned to face the mountains.
Ben listened to the wind gently ruffling the leaves of the trees around them and the sound of the birds and said, “Ridley is gone, but his script continues to run, doesn’t it?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean there was a bloody shootout here last night and dozens of Ardoon spectators with phones but we haven’t had a single visitor. No police, no distraught family members, and no news helicopters. It’s like last night didn’t even happen.”
Lilian nodded. “He did well. I haven’t read the entire thing, but I do know that anarchists toppled some nearby cell towers yesterday afternoon and that the Army notified local law enforcement of a military exercise near this location. Also, all the roads leading to Steepleguard are buried under ten feet of mud, rock, and debris from the storm. Not that it matters, really. The world is falling apart. We are quite forgotten.”
“I wonder where he’s gone,” Ben murmured.
“As do I.” She drew away and looked up, saying, “That reminds me. You should inventory the books in his study when you have an opportunity. I think you will find the collection quite extraordinary and certain books to be particularly useful in the days ahead.”
“Such as?”
“Livy’s Ab Urbe Condita Libri.”
Ben raised his eyebrows. “The History of Rome? I could use a refresher, but I’ve read all of Livy’s works, Lilian.”
“I doubt you’ve read them all.”
He sighed. “Okay, I’ve read all his surviving works. Over a hundred volumes of History have been lost.”
She pushed out her lower lip and gazed at the sky. “Well, I wouldn’t say lost. The Nisirtu didn’t care for the content in some of books, especially once Livy started swapping notes with Julius Obsequens. Troublemakers, both of them. You’ll find that Ridley has the complete set.”
Before the google-eyed researcher could respond, Lilian continued, “There is also a Greek text by Diophantus that Ridley said was critical to his script calculations. Apparently the man stole some Nisirtu scripting methods and then had the audacity to improve upon them before his work was, shall we say, liberated from him. And there are some unpublished works by someone called Louftcraft that Ridley said you would find interesting.”
“Doesn’t ring a…wait, Lovecraft?”
She shrugged. “Perhaps. I don’t care for the pulp stuff and I’m surprised you do. Anyway, you’ve got plenty of reading material to keep you occupied when winter comes.” The woman l
ingered against him for a second longer before rousing herself and kissing him. “I’ll get to it, then.”
Ben resisted the urge to sprint to Ridley’s study to confirm what Lilian had told him. Instead he returned to the command center and began scanning the monitors that displayed the latest internet and broadcast news coverage of events around the world. He found himself in a state of awe as the headlines rolled in one after another.
…Japanese Prime Minister assassinated during visit to Malaysia. Cage’s variant with 99.97% mortality rate spreading like wildfire through Africa and southern Europe. U.S. warns of imminent launch of ICBMs from North Korea, Iran. Twenty-six Interstate and Major Highway Bridges destroyed in U.S. overnight, crippling transportation system. Cigar-shaped objects seen over every continent. World stock markets in ‘death spiral.’ Thousands reported ill after water systems in Europe and Russia found contaminated by unknown microbe. Marxists storm Moscow demanding return to Soviet ‘prosperity.’ Internet brought to a crawl by ‘Gilgamesh Virus’. U.S. president unlikely to recover from Cage’s, vice president also reported ill. Paramilitary forces overrun seven U.S. National Guard bases in upper Midwest and Texas. Mexican forces reportedly positioning themselves near the Texas border…
“My God,” said Ben as he slowly pivoted and tried to take it all in. Every monitor in the room glowed with its own distinctive version of doom: Fires, explosions, sour faced reporters, terrified citizens, and the words BREAKING NEWS flashing at the tops and bottoms of almost every screen. There were so many things happening at once, all of them disastrous, that it was impossible to focus on any one.
Disparthian said, “This is what Lord Moros called ‘tenderizing’ the Ardoon. The fibers of society are being broken down. Half of what you see on the monitors above is a fiction, Anax. It is misinformation being introduced in order to influence how the survivors behave after the lights go out. The scripts are playing on their fears. People believe what they want to believe most of the time, anyway. Once the sounding boards are removed, they will be transformed from believers to zealots.”
Ben gave the Peth a withering look. “Many of these are your scripts, aren’t they?”
“Yes,” said Disparthian, not avoiding the man’s glare. “I did not write them but I had them written. I did what I had to do to remain in the Seven’s confidence but varied from the objectives when I thought changes would go unnoticed. For example, I was supposed to funnel the population of Southern California to Los Angeles for an imaginary sea evacuation, when in fact there is a nuclear bomb on a freighter there at this very moment.”
“There’s a nuke in Los Angeles?” gasped Ben.
“It’s one of many that have been placed across the globe, Anax. The cities in which they are placed are called ‘colanders.’”
“What were you supposed to do to get people to go to L.A.?”
“Had I followed orders, you would be seeing false reports of dirty bomb detonations in San Diego. Reporters would be sent to selected locations within the city that have been irradiated and coaxed into using Geiger counters on live television. At the same time, texts and emails from thousands of anonymous people would flood social media complaining about nausea, burned skin, breathing problems, and the like.”
“But people in San Diego would have known, right?”
Disparthian shook his head. “Who knows what a dirty bomb looks like? With those reports circulating would you keep your family there?”
Ben said, “In time people would learn the truth.”
“But there is no time, Anax. The scripts elevate everyone’s fears and then shut down any mediums from which they could learn the truth.”
“Are you telling me you didn’t run that script?”
“No, the script is running. I merely swapped the names of the cities,” said the Peth, nodding at one of the monitors.
Ben turned and saw the words NEWS FLASH BREAKING NEWS NEWS FLASH in red at the top of one of the international cable news stations. Below that, DIRTY BOMBS REPORTED DETONATED IN LOS ANGELES and a color map of southern California with concentric circles around the city of Los Angeles.
“You’re pushing them out of L.A.,” said Ben, understanding.
“Yes, Anax. I could not stop the apocalypse, but I could save a few thousand lives.”
“Ardoon lives,” Ben pointed out.
“Human lives,” said the Peth lord, meeting his gaze. “The real bomb will detonate in only a few hours, however. I’m afraid most of the population will still be lost.”
“Why didn’t you just remove the bomb?”
“That was not my domain. I had no role in the military scripts and was not told where the bombs are.”
Ben watched the screens. “I still have to hate you. For being part of this.”
“I understand, Anax.”
“But if what you say is true you will save a lot of lives, and you fought to save the lives of Lilian and Fiela when Moros attacked. I honestly don’t know what to think of you, Lord Disparthian. I really don’t. I think our relationship will be complicated.”
Disparthian nodded once. “Welcome to the Nisirtu, my king.”
