by A. G. Riddle
They stood in the opening to the chamber that held the seemingly endless rows of tubes. “When this vessel receives a death signal and confirms there will be no further transmissions, it assembles a new body, an exact replica down to the last cell and very last memory.”
“This place is—”
“A resurrection ship.”
Dorian tried to wrap his head around it. “So they’re all dead?”
“They died a very long time ago. And I can’t wake them up; won’t wake them up. You saw it. They died badly, in a world that hadn’t known a violent death in too long to remember. But you and I can save them. They are the last of our people. They are counting on you, Dorian.”
Dorian took in the expanse of tubes with a new appreciation. My people. Were there others? “What about the ship in Gibraltar? It’s another resurrection ship?”
“No. It’s something else. A science vessel. A local explorer, incapable of deep space travel. It’s a lander—the alpha lander from the science expedition here. It has eight resurrection pods. Expeditions are dangerous work, and the scientists sometimes have unfortunate accidents. As you know, the resurrection chambers also have the power to heal. Resurrection only works for Atlanteans. And it has a limited range. The nuclear blasts in Gibraltar likely destroyed the pods there. These tubes are the only ones that can resurrect you. But if you venture past a hundred kilometers from here, you won’t resurrect. The system won’t make a copy if it doesn’t have updated data—the Prometea rule. If you go out into the world, you will be mortal again. If you die, you die forever, Dorian.”
Dorian looked over at David’s body. “Why didn’t he—”
“I disabled the resurrection for him. You won’t have to worry about him.”
Dorian glanced at the corridor that led to the outside. “They captured me before. They didn’t trust me.”
“They’ve seen you die, Dorian. When you walk out of here again, risen from the dead with memories of what happened to you, no one will oppose you.”
Dorian hesitated for a second. There was one last question, but he didn’t want to ask it.
“What?” Ares asked.
“My memories… our memories…”
“They will come, in time.”
Dorian nodded. “Then I’ll see you shortly.”
28
David Vale opened his eyes. He stood in another tube but in a different place—not the seemingly endless chamber below Antarctica. This room was small, no more than twenty feet by twenty feet.
His eyes adjusted, and the room came into focus. There were three other tubes—all empty. A large screen dominated the far wall, just above a high-top bar, like the control panels he had seen in the Atlantean structure in Gibraltar and Antarctica. Below it, a crumpled-up suit lay on the floor. A closed door stood at each end of the room.
What is this? What happened to me? To David, the room seemed different from those in Antarctica; it was more like the science lab in the Gibraltar structure that Kate’s father had described in his journal. Was this a science lab? If so, why am I here? For some kind of experiment? And beyond that, he wondered why he kept waking up in these tubes every time Dorian Sloane killed him. That he had now been shot to death multiple times was also hard to wrap his head around, but he had to focus on the more pressing issue: how to get out of the tube. As if on cue, the tube hissed open, and the thin clouds of gray and white fog wafted into the room and dissipated.
David paused, assessing his surroundings, waiting for his unseen captor to make the next move. When nothing happened, he stepped out into the room, struggling on barely responsive legs. He steadied himself at the control station. Below him lay the environmental suit. The helmet sat against the wall, behind the control station. David could now see that the suit was damaged. He bent and rolled it over. It was the same type of suit he had seen in the holo movies in Gibraltar. The Atlanteans had worn them when they had run out of the ship and saved a Neanderthal from a ritual sacrifice near the Rock of Gibraltar.
He examined the suit more closely. A large gash spread across the torso. The result of weapons fire? The material seemed to be severed but not singed. What did it mean? In the videos he had seen, the ship in Gibraltar had exploded after a massive tsunami washed it ashore, then pulled it back out to sea. The Immari had assumed that a series of methane pockets on the sea floor had exploded, ripping the ship into several pieces.
The explosion had incapacitated one of the Atlanteans in the suits, and the other had carried him or her through a door—presumably to Antarctica.
Was this suit from one of the two Atlanteans in Gibraltar? David stood and searched the room for any other clues. On a small bench behind the control station, he could see a garment of some kind, neatly folded.
He hobbled to the bench. His legs were getting better, but they weren’t one hundred percent yet. He unraveled the bundle. It was a black military uniform. He held it up to the dim LED-like lights that shined from floor and ceiling. The suit glistened and seemed to reflect the light. It almost looked like a projection of a starry night. He moved it around, and the suit changed again, matching the light and walls behind it. It was some kind of active camouflage. The entire reflective top—the tunic of the uniform—was smooth and without markings except for the collar. Its right side had a square emblem: [II].
I.I. Immari International. This was an Immari Army uniform.
On the left side of the collar, a silver oak leaf spread out—the insignia of a lieutenant colonel’s rank.
David tossed the uniform back on the bench. He was naked, and he’d rather stay that way than put the uniform on.
He walked over to the control station and waved his hand over it. Kate’s father had learned to work these Atlantean control stations. For him, a blue and green light would emanate and interact with his hand, but this control station was dark and dead. David pressed his fingers to it, but it gave no reaction.
He glanced back and forth between the doors. There was nothing like being a rat in a cage. He walked to the closest door and stood for a moment, but it didn’t slide open. He ran his hand over the panel beside it. Dead. He flattened his hands on the gray metal and pushed, but it didn’t move. It was sealed shut, like the bulkhead door in a submarine.
He tried the same routine on the opposite door but got the same result. He was trapped. How much air did he have? How long could he last before he starved to death?
He sat on the bench in silence, alone with only his thoughts. No matter how hard he tried, they always drifted to Kate. David wondered where she was at that very moment. He prayed she was safe.
He thought about their one night together in Gibraltar, how different he felt in that moment. Then he had awoken to find her gone. He forgave her for that; she had been trying to save him. But he had made another mistake: letting her out of his sight again in Antarctica when he had stayed behind to hold off Dorian and his men.
David decided he wouldn’t let that happen again. If he ever got out of this room, he would find Kate, wherever she was in whatever was left of the world, and he would never let her out of his sight again.
29
Marbella, Spain
Kate had awoken in the dark confines of a semi trailer filled to the brim with people, packed in like a fresh catch on the way to a fish market at the pier. Or at least, that was what it smelled like: sweat and fish. People coughed and elbowed as the trailer bounced incessantly. The truck pulling it must have been doing top speed through Marbella’s bumpy streets.
Kate wanted to find Martin, but she could barely see a few feet in front of her. She settled for sitting quietly against the wall in a less-crowded section of the trailer, near the front, far away from the double doors at the end.
The truck slowed, stopped for a few seconds, and continued on, barely creeping this time. Then it came to an abrupt halt, and its air brakes squeaked loudly. The rumbling engine died a few seconds later.
A wave of panic seemed to sweep the trailer’s inh
abitants. They were all on their feet and rushing the door a split second before it opened.
The light from the setting sun revealed the scene beyond. Kate stood there, taking it in, letting the people flow around her.
The two blue Orchid flags that had hung on the fence were simply charred remains. The Immari had left the remnants hanging, perhaps as a symbol, a sign of their triumph. They had placed their own black flag on each side of the camp’s entrance. Immari soldiers in black uniforms paced in the guard tower above—the one that hadn’t been completely destroyed.
The trailer was emptying quickly now. Kate’s mind grasped for a plan. She slipped the backpack off her shoulders and unzipped it. The pack had some kind of heavy lining. Fire and waterproof? Kate surveyed the contents: a handgun, the laptop, a sat phone, Martin’s notebook, and the thermos-like device he had placed the sample in. She took the gun out. She couldn’t shoot her way out of here; in fact, she wasn’t sure she could shoot the gun at all. She needed a better plan, and if she was caught with the gun… She slid it into the darkened corner. She needed to keep the other equipment—Martin had saved it; it must be essential to finding the cure.
Martin had also told her what would happen next: the Immari would sort everyone. The dying would be left to die. The survivors could either pledge or perish.
She had a choice to make.
30
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Atlanta, Georgia
Dr. Paul Brenner paced in front of the screens that covered the wall. The world map they displayed was covered with red dots: one for each Orchid district. A number floated above every point: the Orchid failure rate for that district. Since the outbreak, Orchid had been ineffective for roughly 0.3% of those infected. Now the numbers were climbing. In one district in Germany, almost one percent of the inhabitants were now dying from the plague. Was Orchid finally failing?
They had seen temporary, localized Orchid failures, but that had been due to formulation issues—manufacturing. This was global. If it was another… Paul resisted even thinking the word mutation but if it was…
“Roll it back,” Paul said. “Show Orchid failure rates one hour ago, two hours ago. Keep stepping back an hour until they stabilize.”
Paul watched the numbers gradually decrease, then level out. “Stop right there.” He glanced at the time.
He walked to his station in the large conference room and rifled through a stack of papers. What had happened then? Had the Immari released a mutated virus—one Orchid couldn’t stop? That was their plan, or at least that was the working theory. He focused on the memos regarding Immari activity. One caught his eye. He checked the time. It was close. He scanned it.
eyes only
Suspected Nuclear Explosion at Immari Corporate Research Campus outside Nuremberg, Germany
Cause (best theory): industrial accident; detonation of an experimental weapon, part of Immari Research Advanced Weapons Program
Alternative Explanations:
(1) Immari believed to have removed object from location in Antarctica for study in Germany; possibly connected.
(2) Immari could have purposefully destroyed facility to prevent Allied seizure following their invasion of southern Spain.
Paul took a deep breath. He was sure of two things: one, that Orchid was failing around the world, and two, that it had begun with an Immari act. How much time did they have? One, possibly two days? Was there anything they could do in that amount of time?
“Get the group on the line,” Paul said. It was time to throw a Hail Mary pass.
31
David Vale had tried the doors and control panel more times than he could count. He had even gone and stood in the tube, hoping it might activate an escape route. The room hadn’t changed since he had awoken. He could feel himself getting weaker. He had a few hours left, maybe.
He needed to make a move. He walked to the damaged Atlantean suit that lay crumpled on the floor. Maybe if he put it on… He held it to his chest and let the legs hang down. They barely cleared his calves. David was six-foot-three and broad-shouldered. The owner had been under six feet and rather small in stature, a woman perhaps. He dropped the suit and looked over at the other suit—the Immari colonel’s uniform, crisp and new.
He sat on the bench next to it for a long while. It was the only thing he hadn’t tried. What choice do I have? He grudgingly slid the pants on, then the boots. He stood and held the tunic for a moment. The four oval glass tubes in the room each reflected a warped view of his figure. Gone were the fresh gunshot wounds in his chest and shoulder. Across his chest, older scars had also been erased: burns from a falling building that had trapped him in the 9/11 explosions, a stab wound just below his ribcage that he had received during an operation outside Jakarta, and a smattering of shrapnel impacts from Pakistan. He was a new man. But his eyes were the same—intense but not hard.
He ran a hand through his short blond hair, exhaled, and stared for a long second at the tunic, the last piece of the ensemble. He pulled the tunic on, and it glistened as it adjusted to the light.
David wondered if he would wake up in a tube again if he died. As if reading his mind, a small crack sprinted up the length of the first tube. Spider-like smaller cracks erupted at every angle, multiplying and expanding like cells dividing in a petri dish. The other tubes followed suit until the four clear glass tubes were so clouded with cracks they looked white. A series of soft pops rolled across the tubes, and the tiny pieces of cracked glass began falling inward.
Where the four tubes had stood, a series of cone-shaped piles of glass now lay, twinkling in the sharp light like stacks of diamonds.
Guess that answers that question, David thought. Whatever happened beyond this room, there would be no resurrection here.
The door to his right hissed as it slowly broke free from the wall and slid open. David walked to the threshold and peered out. A narrow, tight corridor spread out as far as he could see. Beady lights on the floor and ceiling barely illuminated the space.
He began down the long hallway, and the door to the tube room closed behind him. There were no doors on either side of the corridor, and it was smaller than the passages he had seen before. Was it an escape conduit or a maintenance tube? After a few minutes, the hallway ended at a large, oval door. It opened as he approached, revealing a round room that must have been an elevator. David stepped inside and waited. It didn’t feel like he was moving, but he did have the sensation that the platform was rotating.
A minute passed, and the door opened with a shudder. The rush of air threw David against the back wall, but the force quickly dissipated.
The air was damp, definitely subterranean. The space beyond the door was dark as night. David crossed the threshold. The walls were rock, but they were smooth—a machine had bored this hole. Where am I? It was cool but not freezing. This wasn’t Antarctica. Gibraltar?
The pathway was on an incline, maybe twenty degrees. Did it lead to the surface? There was no light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe it turned up ahead.
David spread his arms out and set off, dragging his fingers across the sides of the shaft, hoping to detect any change. None came, but the air grew warmer and dryer with every step. Still the end was dark. Then an electric wave swept over him, like a field of static electricity crackling and pricking across his skin.
The cool, dark tunnel was gone, and David stood outside in a mountainous place. It was night, and the stars above shone bright—brighter than he had ever seen them, even in Southeast Asia. If this was Europe or northern Africa, then all the light pollution was gone. And if so… In the distance, over the closest rock ridge, the sounds of gunfire and explosions echoed into the night. David rushed forward, stumbling over the uneven rock, and steadied himself at the top of the ridge.
To his left, the mountains dived into a coastline that stretched into the distance. David struggled to understand what he was seeing—it looked almost as though two worlds from diffe
rent times had been thrown together.
Some kind of post-apocalyptic “fortress,” or maybe an army base from the future, lay on a peninsula with a long harbor. The peninsula jutted at least five kilometers into the sea and narrowed to perhaps only a hundred meters where it met the landmass—the perfect chokepoint to defend the base from ground attacks. A large wall rose there, towering above a burned-out wasteland beyond it. Waves of soldiers on horseback charged toward the wall, shooting and shouting. It looked almost like a medieval raid on a castle—a castle from far in the future. David stepped closer to the edge, marveling, trying to get a better view. The lead riders unleashed something.
A massive explosion erupted and a mushroom of fire rose from the wall, sending David staggering back and illuminating the area around the fortress. On the other side of the narrow sea, David caught a glimpse of a massive rock cliff jutting high above the water. The Rock of Gibraltar. He was in Northern Morocco, across the Straits of Gibraltar. The peninsula was home to Ceuta, an autonomous Spanish city. Or had been, before someone turned it into a fortress. There were still traces of the city, but—
Behind him, David heard trucks cranking. He turned just in time to see a spotlight snap on, blinding him. The light from the explosion had revealed him to someone in the mountains.
A man’s voice called down to him from above. “Don’t move!”
He jumped off the ridge as bullets raked the cliff. He stumbled back to the rock face where he had emerged and felt around desperately for the entrance. It wasn’t there. Whatever he had passed through was a one-way door, some kind of force field that looked and felt like rock out here.
