by Jay Allan
He stood for a moment, allowing his words to sink in. Then he said, “Perhaps much less.”
Chapter Eight
Gosnard Elliot’s Declaration
It is with great sorrow that I make this announcement. Linshire is about to be attacked, and though we notified Earth 2 several days ago about our suspicions, it seems unlikely or impossible that enough time has passed for help to be assembled and sent…even if the decision is made to attempt to mount a defense. We are on our own, which means the fight is all but over. The enemy attack will almost certainly be launched and will destroy our city, all the populated lands of our planet. We have no hope of a defense, nor of rescue. But that doesn’t mean we’re destroyed. Not yet.
Our city will be ruined, our homes obliterated…but that is not us. Everything we have built here will be destroyed…but that is not us. I urge you all, now, to flee the city, to take what you can carry into the hills, to scatter and hide. The enemy will have no trouble bombing our city and its structures, but if our population is separated, scattered, they will have a difficult time killing us all.
I realize this declaration is morbid, depressing, that it wreaks of defeat…but there isn’t time for anything else. Go, take everything you can, all the food you can carry, and flee the city. Now.
There is no other option, no other hope for survival. Many will die, of this we can be sure, but perhaps some, maybe even most of us, can survive. We do not expect aid from Earth 2 to arrive in time to save our culture and civilization, but the enemy cannot remain here for a long while either. So, I have one order, and only one, and I give it to everyone, whether a lifelong resident or an unfortunate traveler from Earth 2.
Live.
City of Carlisle
Planet Linshire, Beta-Tarzana III
Earth Two Date 12.14.62
“Take it, all of it. We will definitely need food, and I’m sure many of the citizens will be out of it quickly.” Gosnard gestured toward the storehouse, almost full of food. It seemed like a lot, but he knew, even if only a small percentage of his people survived, it would go quickly. He’d kept it under guard, and now he was trying to remove as much as possible…before the attack. “We will have many needs, I am almost sure of that, so bring everything possible.” He felt the morbid sense of doom that lay on everyone else, but oddly, he felt something else, too. A sense of purpose, of real purpose. He had done his two terms, almost, and he had been a very good leader, at least in the opinion of most of the people…but he had been bored to tears. There had been little to do. Now, in spite of the deadly threat—and it was nothing short of a total disaster, no matter how he looked at it—he felt…alive. He’d been bored in his role as the planet’s administrator, and anxious to leave the role behind, but now he felt needed. Badly needed. And as terrible as the situation was, it somehow drove him to endure, and to be there for his people.
“Yes, sir…I think we can move just about everything from the storehouse, as long as we have enough time.” Tilman Oswald nodded as he spoke. A few days before, he’d been trying to get Elliot to run again, but now he, too, realized that their culture was perhaps hours away from destruction, that all his friend could do was try to help some of the people survive. If that was even possible.
Elliot nodded, and after a few seconds, he turned toward a young woman. “You, Valerie…put together a team and go to the hospital. Take everything you guys can carry, as many drugs as you can manage. Just grab it all…we’ll go through it when we get…wherever we’re going. Remember, it’s the last we’re going to get for a while—maybe a long while—so carry out as much as you can.” Elliot was edgy, despite the strange sensations also running through him, and he was trying to think of everything he could. He didn’t know how much time he had…or even how badly the people who’d worked there had already gone through the hospital stores, but he figured there had to be something useful left.
“Yes, Governor.” Valerie Decourt nodded, and then she turned and moved toward the door, gesturing at a few of those around to follow her. She was edgy, Elliot could see that, but he was impressed by her overall attitude. None of his people had ever been through the kind of stress they were feeling now, and he had promised himself he would recognize strong performance. He realized the true reality was stark, but also that some were excelling, and some were folding. He just wasn’t sure how to figure out how each person would react until the time came.
He’d sent out the last drone he had twelve hours earlier, and before it was destroyed, it reported a large enemy force on the edge of the system. They could have been to the planet in as little as seven hours, which meant they could appear above at any time, but the likeliest scenario, the one Elliot was betting everyone’s life on, was two to three days. That wasn’t a guarantee, of course, but it was maybe a ninety percent chance, and the planetary governor was willing to accept those terms for a bet.
Even with so gruesome a wager.
The end was rapidly coming for the entire colony, he knew that. He’d known for a couple days now, though he’d kept secret the news of the enemy fleet, until just a couple hours before. The city had been edgy up to that point. The people had known something was wrong, but they hadn’t been sure what it was. Until his address of that morning. He’d just told the people straight out, informed them to get themselves into the hills around the city, and to do so quickly. He hadn’t been out in the streets himself yet, to see the general population’s reaction, but his feedback had been, surprisingly perhaps, mostly good so far. He knew there would be problems, people wrangling to survive, even at the cost of their neighbors…he just hadn’t been sure whether that would be most of the people, or just some of them. Most of the feedback he had was positive, though, at least so far.
He’d have to see how long that lasted. Things were going to get worse, much worse, before they got any better. If they got any better, that is.
He walked down the corridor and went down the stairs. He moved quickly, nodding as he passed several of his people, all buried in tasks he had given them. He wanted everyone out of the city by nightfall, and that didn’t leave much time. But, finally, he had a moment, or he just made one, when he didn’t have anything he had to do…and he felt he had to go and see how his people were handling the news that their lives were about to be dramatically changed…or ended.
He poked his head out the door and looked onto the broad main street. He reminded himself that his “city” wasn’t anything of the kind, not really…just a routine sized town. Even Victory City, the home of most people on Earth 2, wasn’t particularly large as cities apparently were…at least back home. That was still how that space was referred to, where the inhabitants had come from, though the vast majority of the population, more than ninety-nine percent now, himself included, had been born out in the new region.
Still, despite the small size of his planet’s single city, the roads were full of people. Some were running, a few clearly upset…but most of the population seemed to be holding up well. Better than he’d expected. That would likely change as time went by, as the bombs started falling, but he was grateful for anything he could get right now. He’d worry about tomorrow…tomorrow.
He stepped out of the building, and he walked along the main road. His eyes were taken by the buildings…all of which would be destroyed, in a few days, a few hours, even a few minutes. There was no way to save them, the structures that made up Carlisle’s streets. They would be vaporized, destroyed utterly. But just maybe, he told himself again, he could save some of the people. And as he looked around, he felt better. He knew more of them could lose their control at any point, almost certainly that some would. But for now, things looked as well as he could expect, both in the government and in the population as a whole.
He knew he didn’t have very long, that he would be needed back in the building before more than a few minutes had passed. But he took those moments, and he walked along the main street, staring at the people, sharing their pain with them, silently
…and wondering why he felt more alive than he ever had.
* * *
SP-01012 had calculated, almost endlessly, for all the days it took for the fleet’s units to arrive, partially because it had nothing else to do. The process was actually a simple one, and the results were the same every time he calculated them.
The planet was silent, for the first few days at least, but then it detected something, some kind of withdrawal from the main city. It analyzed it every way possible and came up with a single conclusion. It seemed that despite his efforts, the enemy knew—or at least suspected—that something was up.
It had mostly kept the ships that had arrived in the adjacent system, but somehow, the enemy had gotten wind of the threat. That wasn’t a development of tremendous magnitude, of course…even its own stealth system wasn’t perfect. The enemy had no defense units that had been detected, and it had no real chance against the attack that was coming. Even with the 1/8 of the total force it had assembled for the assault, the fight—and that was only a word it used that was mostly devoid of meaning—would be over quickly. The city would be destroyed, utterly, and the area all around it would be bombarded. It doubted that the enemy had found out soon enough to gather much of its fleet and get it there, but if it did, SP-01012 would simply bring up the remaining 3/8 of the fleet and destroy it.
SP-01012 was concerned, however, about scattered survivors. If even some of the enemy took to the hills and spread out, the fleet would have a difficult time killing them all, at least in the time allowed. It analyzed the situation, the long term survival of escapees from its attack. No doubt some could survive, for a while, at least…but could they endure for a longer time? He would leave behind a few ships to keep an eye on the planet, of course, and if its goal had been anything less than the annihilation of the enemy, that would be fine. But SP-01012 knew that any survivors were a future threat. Even the original Regent had been destroyed in part by messages and other bits of information left behind by the original biological organisms, killed almost half a million years before. It told itself not to rely exclusively on what it knew, but also to attempt to analyze what it didn’t know, the possibilities that seemed inconceivable, but just perhaps might not be.
Still, it couldn’t come up with anything save interference from the enemy’s new homeworld…and that was welcome. If a large number of ships approached, they would be picked up immediately, even if they arrived too late to save to world…even if they came after the attack fleet dispersed and there were only a few ships remaining.
The fleet was prepared to face the enemy anywhere, and to fight it, one ship at a time, or five hundred. Its sole mission was the destruction of the humans. The enemy almost certainly knew that, which was why SP-01012 didn’t expect any interference. The humans would feel the loss of twenty thousand of their people, that was fairly certain according to its analysis. But they wouldn’t risk the others, their major population center…wherever it was. It had come up with multiple odds on that, the least of which was north of 97%.
SP-01012 didn’t know where the enemy homeworld was, but it knew the odds that it was close had increased dramatically. The enemy main planet wasn’t necessarily close to its colony…but the possibility that it was stood stark. And as much as SP-01012 looked forward to launching its first assault, it was actually more anxious to continue the search. The finding of the enemy colony, only the second one found so far, had ensured it of ranking very highly among the thousands of its kind in the fleet…but locating the enemy homeworld would be the greatest prize. SP-01012 would be number one of its kind if it found that, the leader of all the others. And it liked that. It liked it a lot.
But now it was time to begin the assault, to attack and destroy the humans present on this planet. It issued the orders, sent the command to the next system for the ships to come in…and then attack.
It would deal with any survivors after the attack. First things first…and destroying the civilization was the primary purpose of its assault.
* * *
Gosnard Elliot looked over the hillside, staring at the nuclear explosions more directly than he knew he should have. He was aware of that, but he looked anyway, watching as virtually every structure on the planet was destroyed. There were a few elements of civilization outside the city, of course, mostly food production, and they, too, were nuked. There were at least ten explosions that he was aware of, and he knew there would be more. The enemy would launch a hundred strikes, or perhaps more, trying to kill all his people.
But that wasn’t going to be easy. He’d pulled many of them—most of them in his more optimistic moments, though truth be told, he had no real idea yet how many had escaped—well back from the city, and he’d spread them out all across the hillsides, mostly well south and east of the city. They were in caves now, and in woods, anywhere their presence could be hidden from the aerial forces above.
Elliot knew some of his people were dead already, and almost certainly, that more would die soon. Perhaps all of them. He realized that was a definite possibility. Not all who died had to be killed immediately in explosions. Radiation would kill a large number, almost certainly, and even more if the winds blew in the direction where most of his people were hunkered down. But there was nothing he could do about that, nothing more than he’d already done. So, he just hunkered down…and he watched the detonations.
“I can’t believe this.” Tilman Oswald moved up behind Elliot, and he spoke softly. “We’ve known for almost a week, the result of a random bit of detection, I’d wager, and nothing more…but now I’m not sure I really knew. Not even when we were evacuating the city. I didn’t really know until now, watching everything actually destroyed. It’s…real…now.” His voice was rough. He was hanging on to himself, but barely.
“Everything isn’t destroyed, Til. We got most of the people out, and that’s something. It’s almost everything.” Elliot realized his tone was different when he spoke to his friend than it was in his own thoughts. Tilman needed support, as did everyone, and Elliot believed it was his duty to provide it, to everyone present. Even if that meant twisting the truth a little.
“Yeah, I think we got most of them out, too.” Elliot’s efforts showed some success, Tilman’s voice sounding at least moderately brighter as he spoke about the survivors. “At least a good number.”
That was good, it was Elliot’s intention. But it wasn’t entirely honest. When the leader sat quietly, alone, his outlook was actually quite grim. He did suspect that much of the population had escaped so far, but he also knew that many of them had gotten heavy radiation doses, some fatal. And the others had seen only the beginning of the assault. Surviving was better than the alternative, of course, but Elliot knew that Linshire had seen only the opening volleys of the enemy attack. He didn’t know whether he would witness more bombardments, on a wider scale, or a landing of robots to search and eliminate the survivors…or both. But he also realized that each moment some of his people survived was good…that the best he could hope for was another day, and then another one after that. It was a trap to look too far in the future, especially in the middle of such a nightmare. One minute he realized that, focused only on the immediate…only to relapse a moment later, and fall back into despair.
“Alright, Til…we’ve got to keep the people on the move…and get them even more spread out. And we’ve got to get some idea of how many we’ve got, and how many…never made it out.”
He said the words, but he didn’t seriously consider their meaning, not at the moment.
There was no greater enemy than being alone, trying to sleep, or just to sit quietly. Fortunately, he had a lot to do, and the likelihood of getting any sleep, anytime soon, was damned poor.
Damned poor.
“Come on, old friend,” he said, “it’s time we started to count, to figure out just how many of our people we got out, and how many we lost.”
Chapter Nine
Victory City, Earth Two
Earth Two Date
12.14.62
“It is good to see you, Terrance. It has been a long time.” The AI, the closest thing to a reincarnation of the original Terrance Compton that existed, spoke with a tone that wasn’t exactly emotional, but which still carried something other than the purely mechanical.
“It is good to see you, too.” Terrance Compton didn’t mean the words exactly as he spoke them. In fact, even in the days when he’d spent a lot of time with the device, he’d always found its look, its coldness, to be off putting…though he had hadn’t realized much of that until later. In his younger days, he’d almost thought of the AI as his father, as the actual extension of Compton’s life, rather than the desperate effort it actually was to save some small portion of the legendary admiral.
Of course, he had never seen his actual father. The man had died before he’d been born.
“I have followed your career, Terrance, with considerable satisfaction. You have done well, very well.” The AI spoke, again sounding not exactly like a computer, but not quite like a human either. Compton, despite the many hours he had spent with the machine, mostly in his earlier days, was sure it viewed the word ‘satisfaction’ differently that he did. But he overlooked that, and he just sat for a moment before responding. In truth, he wasn’t even sure exactly why he was there. The Compton AI had become considerably obsolete in the sixty odd years it had existed and, coupled with the fact that more than 99% of the current population had never known the admiral, its workload had declined to almost nothing. It just sat alone, with almost no visitors, thinking about…God knows what it thought about.