by A. G. Riddle
At that moment, for some reason I can’t understand, all I can think about is the last time I saw my father—the day before I shipped off to the war. He got drunk as a sailor that night and lost control—the first, last, and only time I ever saw him lose control. He told me about his childhood that night, and I understood him, or so I thought. How much can you ever really understand any man?
We lived in a modest home in downtown Charleston, West Virginia, alongside the homes of people who worked for my father. His peers—the other business owners, merchants, and bankers—lived across town, and my father liked it that way.
He paced the living room, spitting as he spoke. I sat there in my pristine tan US Army uniform, the single brass bar of a second lieutenant’s rank hanging on my collar.
“You look as foolish as another man I knew who joined the army. He was almost giddy as he ran back to the cabin. He waved the letter in the air like the king himself had written it. He read it to us, but I didn’t understand it all then. We were moving down to America—a place called Virginia. The war between the states had broken out about two years earlier. I can’t remember exactly when, but it was getting pretty bloody by this point. And both sides needed more men, fresh bodies for the grinder. But if you were rich enough, you didn’t have to go. You just had to send a substitute. Some rich southern planter had hired your grandfather as his substitute. A substitute. The idea of hiring another man to die in the war in your place, just because you have the money. When they start the conscriptions this go round, I’ll see to it in the senate that no man can send a replacement.”
“They won’t need conscripts. Brave men are joining by the thousands—”
He laughed and poured another drink. “Brave men by the thousands. Fools by the train car load—joining because they think there’s glory in it, maybe fame and adventure. They don’t know the cost of war. The price you pay.” He shook his head and took another long pull, almost emptying the glass. “Word will get around soon, and then they’ll have to draft, just like the states did during the Civil War. They didn’t at first, this was years after the war started, when people got a taste of it, that’s when they began the conscriptions and rich men started writing to poor men like my father. But the post runs slow in the Canadian frontier, especially if you’re a logger living way out of town. By the time we got down to Virginia, this planter had already hired another substitute, said he hadn’t heard from your grandfather, was scared he’d have to show up himself, heaven forbid. But we were in Virginia, and he was hell-bent on fighting for a fortune—up to a thousand dollars, that’s what the substitutes were paid—and it was a fortune, if you could collect it. Well, he didn’t. He found another planter who was up against it, and he wore that wretched gray uniform and died in it. When the South lost, society crumbled, and the huge tract of land promised to your grandfather as payment was bought by some northern carpetbagger on the steps of the county courthouse for pennies on the dollar.” He finally sat down, his glass empty.
“But that was the least of the horror of Reconstruction. I watched my only brother die of typhoid while the occupying Union soldiers ate us out of house and home—what home there was, a small run-down shack on the plantation. The new owner kicked us out, but my mother made a deal: she’d work the fields if we could stay. And she did. Worked those fields to death. I was twelve when I walked off the plantation and hitched my way to West Virginia. Work in the mines was hard to get, but they needed boys, the smaller the better—to crawl through the narrow spaces. So that’s the cost of war. Now you know. At least you don’t have a family. But that’s what you have to look forward to: death and misery. If you’ve ever wondered why I was so hard on you, so frugal, so demanding—there it is. Life is hard—for everyone—but it’s hell on earth if you’re foolish or weak. You’re neither, I’ve seen to it, and this is how you repay me.”
“This is a different war—”
“It’s always the same war. Only the names of the dead change. It’s always about one thing: which group of rich men get to divvy up the spoils. They call it ‘The Great War’—clever marketing. It’s a European Civil War, the only question is which kings and queens will divvy up the continent when it’s all over. America’s got no business over there, that’s why I voted against it. The Europeans had the good sense to stay out of our civil war, you’d think we might do the same. Whole affair is practically a family feud between the royal families, they’re all cousins.”
“And they’re our cousins. Our mother country’s back is against the wall. They would come to our aide if we were facing annihilation.”
“We don’t owe them a thing. America is ours. We’ve paid for this land with our blood, sweat, and tears—the only currency that’s ever mattered.”
“They need miners desperately. Tunnel warfare could end the war early. You’d have me stay home? I can save lives.”
“You can’t save lives.” He looked disgusted. “You haven’t understood a word I’ve said, have you? Get out of here. And even if you do make it back from the war, don’t come back here. But do me one favor, for all I’ve given you. When you figure out that you’re fighting some other man’s war, walk away. And don’t start a family until you take that uniform off. Don’t be as cruel and greedy as he was. We walked through the devastation of the North to reach that plantation in Virginia. He knew what he was getting into, and he charged on. When you see war, you’ll know. Make better choices than the one you made today.” He walked out of the room, and I never saw him again.
I’m so lost in the memory I barely notice the throngs of people that file past us, introducing themselves and touching Helena’s stomach. We sit there like a royal couple at some state function. There are dozens of scientists, in town no doubt to study the room we recently uncovered. I meet the heads of Immari divisions overseas. The organization is massive. Konrad Kane marches over. His legs and arms are rigid, his back straight and unbending, as if he were being probed with some unseen instrument. He introduces the woman at his side—his wife. Her smile is warm and she speaks kindly, which catches me off guard. I’m a little embarrassed at my harsh demeanor. A young boy runs from behind her and jumps into Helena’s lap, crushing her stomach. I grab him by the arm, jerking him off of her and back onto the ground. My face is filled with rage, and the boy looks as though he will cry. Konrad locks eyes with me, but the boy’s mother has her arms around him, admonishing, “Be careful, Dieter. Helena is pregnant.”
Helena straightens in the chair and reaches for the boy. “It’s okay. Give me your hand, Dieter.” She takes the boy’s arm and pulls him to her, placing the hand on her stomach. “You feel that?” The boy looks up at Helena and nods. Helena smiles at him. “I remember when you were inside your mama’s stomach. I remember the day you were born.”
Lord Barton steps between Konrad and me. “It’s time.” He looks at the woman and the child palming Helena’s swollen belly. “Excuse us, ladies.”
Barton leads us through the hall, to a large conference room.
The other apostles of the apocalypse are here waiting on us: Rutger, Mallory Craig, and a cadre of other men, mostly scientists and researchers. The introductions are hasty. These men are clearly less star-struck with me. There’s another quick round of congratulations and hyperbole like we’ve cured the plague; then they get down to business.
“When will we get through—to the top of the stairwell?” Konrad asks.
I know what I want to say, but curiosity gets the better of me. “What are the devices in the chamber we found?”
One of the scientists speaks. “We’re still studying them. Some sort of suspension chamber.”
I had assumed as much, but it sounds less crazy when a scientist says it. “The room is some sort of laboratory?”
The scientists nod. “Yes. We believe the building is a science building, possibly one giant lab.”
“What if it’s not a building?”
The scientist looks confused. “What else could it be?”
“A ship,” I say.
Barton lets out a laugh and speaks jovially. “That’s rich, Patty. Why don’t you focus on the digging and leave the science to these men?” He nods appreciatively at the scientists. “I assure you they’re better at it than you are. Now, Rutger has told us you’re worried about water and gas above the stairs. What’s your plan?”
I press on. “The walls, inside the structure. They look like bulkheads in a ship.”
The lead scientist hesitates, then says, “Yes, they do. But they’re too thick, almost five feet. No ship would need walls that thick, and it wouldn’t float. It’s also too large to be a ship. It’s a city; we’re fairly certain of that. And there are the stairs. Stairs on a ship would be very curious.”
Barton holds up his hand. “We’ll sort out all these mysteries when we’re inside. Can you give us an estimate, Pierce?”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
For a brief moment, my mind drifts back to that night in West Virginia, then I’m back in the room, staring at the Immari Council and the scientists. “Because I’m done digging. Find someone else,” I say.
“Now look here, my boy, this isn’t some social club, some frivolous thing you join and then quit when the dues become too burdensome. You’ll finish the job and make good on your promise,” Lord Barton says.
“I said I’d get you through, and I have. This isn’t my war to fight. I have a family now.”
Barton rises to shout, but Kane catches his arm and speaks for the first time. “War. An interesting choice of words. Tell me, Mr. Pierce, what do you think is in that last tube?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care.”
“You should,” Kane says. “It’s not human, and it doesn’t match any bones we’ve ever found.” He waits for my reaction. “Let me connect the dots for you, as you seem either unable or remiss to do so. Someone built this structure—the most advanced piece of technology on the planet. And they built it thousands of years ago, maybe hundreds of thousands of years ago. That frozen ape-man has been in there for who knows how many thousands of years. Waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“We don’t know, but I can assure you that when he and the rest of the people who built that structure wake up, the human race is finished on this planet. So you say this isn’t your war, but it is. You can’t outrun this war, can’t simply abstain or move away, because this enemy will chase us to the far corners of the world and exterminate us.”
“You assume they’re hostile. Because you’re hostile, extermination and war and power dominate your thoughts, and you assume the same for them.”
“The only thing we know for sure is this: that thing is some form of man. My assumptions are valid. And practical. Killing them ensures our survival. Making friends does not.”
I consider what he’s said, and I’m ashamed to admit I think it makes sense.
Kane seems to sense my wavering. “You know it’s true, Pierce. They’re smarter than we are, infinitely smarter. If they do let us live, even some of us, we’ll be nothing more than pets to them. Maybe they’ll breed us to be docile and friendly, feeding us by their proverbial campfire, weeding out the aggressive ones, the same way we molded wild wolves into dogs so many thousands of years ago. They’ll make us so civilized we can’t imagine fighting back, can’t hunt, and can’t feed ourselves. Maybe it’s already happening, and we don’t even know it. Or maybe they won’t find us that cute. We could become their slaves. You’re familiar with this concept, I believe. A group of brutal yet intelligent humans with advanced technology subjugating a less advanced group. But this time it will be for the rest of eternity; we would never advance or evolve further. Think of it. But we can prevent that fate. It seems harsh, to go in and murder them in their sleep, but think of the alternative. We will be celebrated as heroes when history learns the truth. We are the liberators of the human race, the emancipators—”
“No. Whatever happens from here, happens without me.” I can’t get the image of Helena’s face out of my mind, the thought of holding our child, of growing old by some lake, of teaching our grandchildren to fish in the summers. I can’t make a difference in the Immari plan. They’ll find another miner. Maybe it will set them back a few months, but whatever is down there will wait.
I stand and stare at Kane and Barton for a long moment. “Gentlemen, you’ll have to excuse me. My wife is pregnant, and I should be getting her home.” I focus on Barton. “We’re expecting our first child. I wish you the best on the project. As you know, I was a soldier. And soldiers can keep secrets. Almost as well as they can fight. But I hope my fighting days are behind me.”
David sat up. “I know what they’re doing.”
“Who?”
“The Immari. Toba Protocol. It makes sense now. They’re building an army. I would bet on it. They think humanity is facing an advanced enemy. Toba Protocol, reducing the total population, causing a genetic bottleneck and a second Great Leap Forward—they’re doing it to create a race of super-soldiers, advanced humans who can battle whoever built that thing in Gibraltar.”
“Maybe. There’s something else. In China, there was a device. I think it has something to do with this,” Kate said.
She told David about her experience in China, about the bell-shaped object that massacred the subjects in the room before melting and then exploding.
When she finished, David nodded and said, “I think I know what it is.”
“You do?”
“Yeah. Maybe. Keep reading.”
89
Jan 18th, 1918
When the butler bursts through the doors to my study, my first thought is Helena: her water’s broken… or she’s fallen, or—
“Mr. Pierce, your office is on the line. They say it’s important, urgent. Regarding the docks, inside the warehouse.”
I walk down to the butler’s office and pick up the phone. Mallory Craig begins speaking before I say a word. “Patrick. There’s been an accident. Rutger wouldn’t let them call you, but I thought you should know. He pressed too hard. Went too far too fast. Some of the Moroccan workers are trapped, they say—”
I’m up and out the door before he finishes. I drive myself to the warehouse and hop in the electric truck alongside my former assistant. We drive as recklessly as Rutger did the first day he showed me the tunnel. The fool has done it—he pressed on and caused a cave-in. I dread seeing it, but urge my assistant to drive faster anyway.
As the tunnel opens on the massive stone room I’ve worked in for the last four months, I notice that the electric lights are off, but the room isn’t dark—a dozen beams of light crisscross the room, the headlamps of the miners’ helmets. A man, the foreman, grabs me by the arm. “Rutger is on the telly for you, Mr. Pierce.”
“On the phone,” I say as I traipse across the dark space. I stop. There’s water on my forehead. Was it sweat? No, there’s another one. A drop of water, from the ceiling—it’s sweating.
I grab the phone. “Rutger, they said there’s been an accident, where are you?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“Don’t play games. Where’s the accident?”
“Oh, you’re in the right place.” Rutger’s tone is playful and confident. Satisfied.
I glance around the room. The miners are milling about, confused. Why aren’t the lights on? I set the phone down and walk over to the electric line. It’s connected to a new cable. I shine my light on it, following it around the room. It runs up the wall… to the ceiling and then over to the stairs, to… “Get out!” I yell. I struggle over the uneven ground to the back of the room and try to corral the workers, but they simply stumble over each other in the choppy sea of light and shadows.
Overhead, a blast rings out in the space and rock falls. Dust envelops the room, and it’s just like the tunnels at the Western Front. I can’t save them. I can’t even see them. I stagger back, into the tunnel—the corridor to the lab. The dust follows me, and
I hear rock close the entrance off. The screams fade away, just like that, like a door closing, and I’m in total darkness except for the soft glow of the white light and fog in the tubes.
I don’t know how much time has passed, but I’m hungry. Very hungry. My headlamp has long since burned out, and I sit in the still darkness, leaning against the wall, thinking. Helena has to be mad with worry. Will she finally find out my secret? Will she forgive me? It all presupposes I’ll get out of here.
On the other side of the rock, I hear footsteps. And voices. Both are muffled, but there’s just enough space between the rocks to hear them.
“HEEEYYYY!”
I have to choose my words carefully. “Get on the telly and ring Lord Barton. Tell him Patrick Pierce is trapped in the tunnels.”
I hear laughter. Rutger. “You’re a survivor, Pierce, I’ll give you that. And you’re a brilliant miner, but when it comes to people, you’re about as thick as the walls to the structure.”
“Barton will have your head for killing me.”
“Barton? Who do you think gave the order? You think I could just knock you off? If so, I would have gotten rid of you a long time ago. No. Barton and Father planned for Helena and me to marry before we were even born. But she wasn’t keen on the idea; may have been why she hopped the first train to Gibraltar when the war broke out. But we can’t escape fate. The dig brought me here too, and life was about to get back on track until the methane leaks killed my crews and you came along. Barton made a deal, but he promised Papa it could be undone. The pregnancy was about the last straw, but don’t worry, I’ll take care of it. So many children die right after birth, from all sorts of mysterious diseases. Don’t worry, I’ll be there to comfort her. We’ve known each other for ages.”
