Shattered Skies

by ALICE HENDERSON

  H124 wondered if that had been the night Olivia learned she was alive.

  Scarlet stared back where their webs still lay in the snow at the bottom of the ridge. “Those things are terrible. You can’t speak. Can’t talk to each other. Can’t voice an opinion. You get an order and all you can do is obey or die.”

  “How long did you have yours?” H124 asked her.

  “Two years. Two years I’ve been fighting to the death for a regime I despise.” She studied the closed entrance of the genebank. “But that stops today. I’m going to kill as many of them as I can.”

  H124 nodded, then checked her rifle and revolver. Glancing around at the others, she said, “Let’s go.”

  They half-walked, half-slid down the more gradual side of the ridge. Moving at a crouch, maneuvering from one place of cover to another, they kept watch for any PPC soldiers who had remained outside. But the place looked deserted, with everyone hiding beyond the doors.

  When they got within ten feet, H124 gave the signal to Onyx to open the doors. She heard a loud, metallic clank, then pushed on the door. It opened a crack. She waved everyone forward, slipping into the genebank.

  Beyond, the place lay shadowed and dark, with only a few lights in the foyer illuminating a pathway to the stairs and elevator.

  The layout was very similar to the other genebanks they’d visited.

  They swept the first room, finding no one on the top floor. Pausing at the top of the stairs, H124 listened, tightly gripping her Glock 9mm. They had to be careful about using weapons in here. Energy propulsions could short out delicate equipment, and bullets could destroy liquid nitrogen tanks.

  They started down the stairwell, stopping at each landing to listen for any hint of movement below.

  Only silence greeted them. The stairs wound down into the earth, the air there holding at a constant temperature, warmer than outside.

  At the bottom of the stairs they reached three doors, all of them closed. H124 tested the handles, finding them all locked.

  Dirk went to work on the first one, prying off the cover plate of the locking mechanism and exposing its wires. The tech was old, but not as old as the vault. Still, it was nowhere near as new as the guns mounted outside. Someone had been here, updating the genebank where needed. With a touch of two wires, the door lock clicked. H124 tested the handle, which gave. She swung the door wide and stepped back, anticipating a rain of fire to reach them on the landing. But no shots came.

  She crept into the room. Scarlet and Garrett trailed close behind, armed with weapons gleaned from dead Death Riders. Dirk and Byron came next, with Astoria taking up the rear, moving backward to cover their six.

  Like in Greenland, the control units and fittings for the liquid nitrogen tanks had been updated. They passed utilitarian shelves full of samples, both seeds and animal DNA. The grey shelves reached all the way to the ceiling, ledge after ledge of genetic material. The room was massive, and it was only the first. The extent of this genebank was far bigger than all the others they’d visited combined.

  No sign of the PPC’s presence made itself known in the room. No destroyed shelves, no PPC belongings. They moved through the entire room and its network of connecting tunnels and chambers, but turned up nothing. All of the samples looked intact, the liquid nitrogen tanks functioning properly. Olivia and the others must have been moving into another part of the facility.

  They returned to the base of the stairs and the other two doorways. Dirk was in the middle of rewiring the second lock when the door suddenly swung open and an arc of electricity snaked out. It connected to the metal railing on the stairs. H124 and the others pressed themselves against the walls, waiting. But no one emerged. Then Byron darted into the open doorway, blasting a deafening shot from his Henry. H124 heard a man scream in pain. She ducked low, taking up position behind Byron. A Death Rider lay writhing in agony, a hole in his chest. No one else was in sight. The man ceased moving, and his arms slumped to the floor.

  Byron advanced, H124 behind him, Dirk taking up the third position. Some of the shelves had been stripped and moved near the door for removal.

  Movement caught H124’s eye to the right, where a flash of blue moved between shelves.

  Astoria caught the motion, too, and kicked over the shelf between them. Fino lay in wait. The exec gasped, covering her face with her hands. Astoria gritted her teeth and let out a roar, unleashing a steady stream of lethal electricity from her energy rifle. It hit the woman, melting her features away, setting her clothes on fire. Astoria kept the stream going until the woman’s flesh liquefied and slumped off her fallen frame.

  “Astoria,” Dirk said gently. “Don’t deplete your rifle’s battery.”

  Only then did Astoria let up. As they filed past the dead Death Rider, Garrett gave his body a savage kick. Free from their bonds, they wreaked vengeance.

  Up ahead, more movement among the shelves caught H124’s attention. She spotted Olivia in her red business suit, sneaking alongside her other junior exec, Caster. The shelves back here were still full of undamaged samples, so Astoria’s approach wouldn’t work. H124 didn’t want to hit anything important. She couldn’t tell if Olivia or Caster was armed.

  As they rounded a shelf, Astoria fired off a shot that hit Caster in the back. He went down, his skin crackling. Olivia raced on.

  Suddenly the report of a shotgun blast filled the room. The broad epaulette-wearing Death Rider dove into view, running out from behind a liquid nitrogen tank. The blast went wide, catching both H124 and Byron with a few stray pellets. She felt her arm sting as one struck near her shoulder. Diving down, she aimed her 9mm, but the Death Rider was too fast. He rolled out of sight, moving through the shelves. She and Byron gave pursuit, while Dirk and the others circled back around a different aisle, hoping to trap Olivia.

  They crept down the aisles, glancing between each shelf, hoping to catch sight of him, but for such a huge man, he was invisible. Behind them they heard something break. They spun, only to find an empty aisle. He was toying with them.

  She and Byron kept going. Epaulettes leapt into view again at the end of the aisle. H124 dove, raising her pistol and firing toward him, not taking the time to aim carefully. The round struck him in the upper thigh. He cried out, firing his shotgun. Byron dashed between two shelving units, and Epaulettes missed them both this time.

  The Death Rider took off, limping as fast as he could, blood dripping on the floor. H124 scrambled to her feet and gave chase, Byron close in tow. She rounded the corner, watching the Death Rider disappear into a neighboring room. She reached the doorway, cautious, pressing herself against the wall, and dared a quick peek. This room had been completely emptied of its original contents. An elaborate four-poster bed, towering wooden armoire, mahogany desk, and velvet chaise lounge filled the room now. She recognized the same furniture from Olivia’s quarters in Delta City.

  She pointed to the armoire, the only visible hiding place in the room, then noticed a second doorway leading off the room to the left. Byron fired a shot through the armoire. The door swung open, revealing a number of expertly tailored suits, but no Death Rider.

  They hastened to the next door.

  This led to a short hallway and another room. They’d be easy targets in the hallway; they’d have to move fast. Blood droplets ran the length of the corridor. Running at a squat, they raced to the next doorway, again pressing against the frame and moving out of sight.

  Byron dared a glance inside, then hugged the wall. “Blood trails to the next room,” he whispered.

  They moved into the next chamber, which had also been emptied of its genebank contents. Another exec had planned to call this room their own. A canopied bed and polished desk had been moved inside.

  The blood trail led them to a hallway at the opposite end. Here the corridor branched, leading to a set of emergency fire escape stairs, and to another set of storag
e rooms.

  The blood brought them into one of the storage rooms, so they followed it cautiously, guns drawn.

  They passed a closed door on their left, opposite the stairwell. But the blood led them past it.

  The storeroom still held all its contents, the shelves storing scores of products made from endangered species parts. This time H124 saw what an elephant foot umbrella stand looked like. She felt sick. She held her breath, following the glistening red drops. They passed into an adjacent storeroom.

  Shouts rang out behind them. They spun as a cacophonous shotgun blast echoed down the corridor.

  The door opposite the stairs burst open, and the Death Rider appeared, Olivia in tow. They raced up the stairs. Somehow he’d doubled back on them, likely running through the connected room as they crept along.

  H124 and Byron raced back the way they’d come, meeting Dirk and the others at the bottom of the stairwell. H124 turned and ran up the stairs, but already Olivia and the Death Rider were out of sight, rounding landings above them.

  She took the stairs two at a time, keeping to the far wall in case the injured man decided to fire his shotgun down over the railing. Natural daylight spilled into the stairwell as a doorway above banged open and shut again.

  H124 raced up the stairs, legs burning, her breath coming in gasps.

  She reached the doorway, an emergency fire exit, and reached for the handle. Flinging it open and darting back out of the way, she narrowly escaped a shotgun blast. Pellets peppered the opposite wall.

  The deep thrum of an airship engine filled the small space, so she dared a look outside to see one landing in the snow, its ramp descending.

  The thing looked ancient, battered and rusted in parts, its hull patched in numerous places. Red and black paintings covered the pilot’s cabin, a skull with eyes of fire, its dangling spine made of gleaming knives. As the ramp came down, two Death Riders came into view, one gripping a rifle, the other a battle axe. Epaulettes gestured for them to return inside. He shoved Olivia ahead of him as H124 and the others emerged from the stairwell, blinking in the bright white landscape.

  She and Astoria fired off shots, but already the pair had disappeared inside, and the ramp closed. The genebank cannon swiveled and fired at the airship, landing a couple good shots in the hull. Then the ship blasted off, moving out of range so quickly the cannon had only hit home twice.

  Winslow hailed H124 over the comm channel. “Sorry we had to keep out of sight. That airship looked like something the Death Riders had salvaged. I managed to fire a tracker at the ship though, before it moved away. They were coming in from the north, probably intending to land and help take over the vault.”

  H124 frowned at Byron. “Olivia’s obviously aligned with them. She probably negotiated to save her own life in exchange for a safe place to wait out the asteroid impact.”

  “Wouldn’t they just have killed her once she got them here?”

  Dirk pursed his lips. “Probably.”

  The sound of the retreating airship now faded completely. “Do you think they’ll be back?” she asked.

  “Guess it depends if they have a backup plan,” said Byron. “Somewhere else to go.”

  Raven appeared on the comm link. “Let’s secure the vault. See what samples we can salvage from what they threw out in the snow.”

  * * * *

  The Argo dropped Raven, Willoughby, and Onyx off by the vault entrance. Winslow remained on board, withdrawing to a safe distance. They all began picking through the discarded DNA material, using maglevs to transport them back inside. It took the rest of the day to fix the damage and replace the samples to their storage spaces.

  The remaining DisPos soldiers returned to the vault, shivering from the brutal cold, a few of them helping to move the shelving. The others took shelter inside, where Raven fed them with food supplies from the Argo.

  The dim sun hovered low on the horizon. As it dipped below, the cold grew even more brutal. Everyone took refuge inside the genebank, taking up spaces on the floor. A few of the DisPos soldiers took over the comfortable quarters of the PPC execs, sleeping three to a bed.

  As H124 leaned against a wall, eating a chewy, dry MRE that was supposed to simulate something called “macaroni and cheese,” her PRD beeped. She brought up the display, seeing a familiar string of numbers. The Phantom Code again.

  First Sanctuary City, then the genebank at Greenland, and now here. Why these places and nowhere else? Nearby, Raven lifted his PRD, also noticing the code.

  Onyx sat next to him, recording the numbers as they streamed in. When they’d finished, she compared the code to the one they’d received at Sanctuary City, then the one from Greenland.

  A thoughtful expression overtook Onyx. “Gordon and I have been puzzling over this. Most of this code is identical. There’s only one place where it changes.” She moved away from the others to a quiet corner. Raven joined her.

  Willoughby entered the room, exhausted. He sat down by H124. “I’m sorry we didn’t get Olivia,” he told H124, stretching out his legs.

  “Me too.”

  “Where is she headed?”

  “According to Winslow and the tracker she attached, north toward Melbourne City.”

  “Maybe she’s hoping the atmospheric shield there will protect them from the effects of the blast.”

  “Can it?” Willoughby asked.

  “I don’t know. She probably had her doubts, too, which is why she came here first.”

  “She’s going to miss that chaise lounge,” he laughed.

  “Probably the only thing she’ll miss.” H124 felt stung by how different Olivia was. How could the woman be of the same flesh and blood as them? She turned to her father. “I’ve been meaning to ask you…what’s my real name? You call me ‘H.’ I’d love to go by my actual name.”

  Willoughby grimaced, hesitating. “To tell you the truth, we never decided on one. You see, before you were born, we had planned on calling you Olivia after your grandmother. But then…well, you know…”

  “Oh, god,” she groaned. “I think I’ll stick to H124.”

  He chuckled. “Figured you would.”

  H124 stretched out on the floor, using her jacket as a pillow. Throughout the night, she drifted in and out of sleep, her fitful dreams making her toss and turn, a fear that Olivia and the Death Riders would return to the vault and slaughter them all.

  “I’ve cracked it!” came a cry across the room.

  Groggily, H124 sat up. She had no idea what time it was.

  Willoughby and Dirk stirred beside her. Astoria was still sleeping, snoring through an open mouth.

  “You’re not going to believe this,” Onyx’s voice came again. H124 and Willoughby hurried over, Dirk following reluctantly after a backward glance at his sleeping sister.

  Onyx’s face lit up. “I know why this code only came into places like the genebanks and Sanctuary City. They know about us. Thought we might eventually visit the DNA vaults.”

  “Who?” Dirk asked, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

  “They’re like us. Held onto science. They’re the ones who’ve been repairing these genebanks. Trying to create a sanctuary for all the imperiled and extinct life. They’ve brought hundreds of species back from extinction.”

  “Rovers?” H124 asked.

  Onyx shook her head. “No. Older. They call themselves the Binit. From what I understand, that was a local word for the first bird they ever brought back, the tawny frogmouth. They took over an entire continent after the PPC died out there from drought and food shortage. These people improved the atmospheric shield there, tore down and removed many of the buildings. Created a thriving, natural habitat. This Phantom Code,” she said, looking around at them, “is an invitation to join them.”

  H124 leaned forward. “Why was the code different in each place?”

 
; Onyx highlighted the disparate section of code on her display. “The directions change depending where the receiver is. Before it was directions from Sanctuary City. This time it’s from Antarctica, and we’ve never been closer, geographically speaking. They’re in Melbourne City. They call it Tathra now.”

  “Melbourne City?” Willoughby frowned. “But the PPC’s still there. I’ve monitored their transmissions.”

  Onyx shook her head in excitement. “No. The code talks about this. The Binit people put out dummy transmissions using PPC tech. They randomly generate programming, just like the PPC does, and broadcast it, so if anyone’s listening in from afar, they think Melbourne City is still up and running. But in actuality, Melbourne City fell more than a hundred years ago.”

  Dirk’s mouth fell open. “How did you decipher this?”

  Onyx grinned, loving the challenge. “The code has missing parts. It’s a substitution cipher, with numbers representing letters. But some of the numbers are null strings. Blanks. I had to substitute correct answers to crack the code, things only people like us would know about. Things about geology, taxonomy of organisms, climatology, oceanography. The PPC would never be able to crack this.”

  “Do they know about the incoming asteroid?” H124 asked.

  Onyx scrolled through the message. “I don’t know. This message was created years ago. It’s been being sent out automatically since then. We’d have to reach out and contact them in return.”

  “They might not know,” Raven said.

  “Wait a minute,” H124 said. “Isn’t Olivia headed toward Melbourne City with that airship full of Death Riders?”