by Bob Mayer
“Where are you?” Turcotte asked.
“Another lab not far from where you dropped me off,” Leahy said. “And not far from where Mrs. Parrish is headquartered. She calls her place Dreamland. It’s where she’s launches her rockets.”
“So what is the great Strategy you’ve been hinting at?” Turcotte asked, sitting on the edge of the pilot’s depression and angling the flexpad so Yakov, sitting on the edge of his, could see.
“The Parrish’s are the latest generation of the leaders of the Myrddin,” Leahy said. “They’ve been around since the time of Merlin. And—“
“Don’t you mean we’ve been around since the time of Merlin?” Turcotte corrected.
Leahy shrugged. “We’re past the point of arguing. Do you want to know what her plan is? Her Strategy? Because once you hear it, you’ll know why I’ve been working to suborn it for over a decade.”
Turcotte acknowledged the rebuke. “Go ahead.”
“The original Strategy was to cleanse the world,” Leahy said.
“I do not like the sound of that,” Yakov said. “Very Hitlerish.”
“No shit,” Leahy said. “As humans we tend to be irrational. Ignore harsh realities when they don’t fit into our worldview. Mr. and Mrs. Parrish, indeed the Myrddin throughout history, have always held a very practical view given they knew about the Airlia and that humans are not the center of the universe. You might object to what I am going to tell you, but understand it is based in cold, hard, reality.
“The Strategy is actually very practical and logical if you have zero empathy for other human beings. The Myrddin have always believed they are acting for the greater good of mankind. Lisa Duncan and her partner gave the original Watchers the mandate to observe, but take no action. Merlin violated that.”
“And it didn’t turn out well,” Turcotte said. “Duncan’s partner was killed, his ka destroyed. Neither Arthur or Mordred won.”
“It actually turned out as it should have,” Leahy contradicted. “The truce between Artad and Aspasia was restored. And Merlin sacrificed himself by taking Excalibur, which controls the master guardian, to the most difficult place on Earth to recover.”
“Yeah,” Turcotte said. “Been there. Done that.”
“You did,” Leahy said. “Please. Let’s not get bogged down in arguing what happened. You want to know the Myrddin Strategy. I am telling you it. For centuries after Merlin we were little different than the original Watchers. Waiting. But we also fought our own battles. George Mallory was one of us. He sacrificed his life on Everest to stop his climbing partner, Irvine, who was infected by a Swarm tentacle, from claiming Excalibur. There are other times—“
Turcotte interrupted. “You just said let’s not get bogged down in history.”
“We had no overall plan though,” Leahy said. “Because we did face the reality that we could not overcome the Airlia. But then my grandfather got into the mothership inside Ararat. He managed to infiltrate the master guardian without being corrupted and—“
“How do you know that?” Yakov demanded.
Turcotte reached across and put a hand on Yakov’s arm. “My friend, I agree with you, that we don’t know much of anything. But let us deal with the immediate situation.” He turned back to the flexpad. “Agreed?”
“Agreed,” Leahy said. She pointed over her shoulder at the Tesla computer. “My grandfather made that. You can consider it a forerunner of the quantum computer. I must admit I actively worked with the Parrish’s years ago when we began to consider a plan. But, initially, the problem we posed to it was how to defeat the Airlia? We fed the data in and it was analyzed. The result? Wait. Let the truce stand.”
“Do not repeat Merlin’s mistake,” Yakov pointed out.
“Yes,” Leahy said. “So.” She took a breath. “So, we decided to analyze strategies if something changed in the truce. If one side or the other won. Or, beyond our wildest hopes, both Airlia sides were defeated.”
“You’re welcome,” Turcotte said.
“And I do thank you,” Leahy said. “Sincerely. You, and Lisa Duncan and Yakov accomplished—“
“And Quinn and Kincaid,” Turcotte said. “They were part of it.”
“As was I,” Leahy said. She pressed on. “The Strategy of Mrs. Parrish was first formulated over ten years ago. Initially by my Tesla computer, but then we developed the first quantum computer; in conjunction with that, a separate, world-wide-web exclusive to Myrddin was developed. This was able to tap into all parts of the Internet, but only in one direction: taking. The computer and the Myrddin web merge together into what is called Ethos. It was kept secret of course. It gave the Myrddin not just a leg up on the Strategy but in making the Parrish’s the richest people on the planet. We were already rich, but now we were far ahead.
“The Strategy was taken from me,” Leahy said. “It became the province of the Parrish’s. Ethos was programmed to come up with projections for the future of mankind. The results were beyond pessimistic. Almost conclusively negative. An eighty-four percent that humanity would be extinct on Earth or approaching it in two hundred years. It was projected that climate change would cause civilization to collapse within one hundred years.”
“Cheery,” Yakov commented.
“Realistic,” Leahy said. “I ran the numbers using the Tesla. Over and over. It agreed with Ethos. That’s reality. You have no idea how much I desired the numbers to turn out differently.”
“So the Strategy?” Turcotte prompted.
“You need to understand that the Strategy is an organic plan, constantly evolving,” Leahy said. “Originally, before you ripped aside the façade at Area 51 and reignited the Airlia Civil War, the plan was basic and straightforward. The Myrddin was working on a way to keep the human race going in the face of these apparently insurmountable odds. Actually, a noble cause.
“They came up with a three-pronged solution that the Strategy gave a good chance of succeeding. First was Perdix, the space program initiative. You saw, are seeing, some of that. The launches of the Nimue and the Niviane. The pod you are towing. The goal was to establish a space station. Then explore and colonize the asteroid Ceres.
“Another possibility was Mars, even though we were aware of the Airlia facility at Cydonia. Mars is a big planet. We had a location selected on the other side. We also considered we might be able to seize the Cydonia facility, which you are now towing the benefit of. The men with you have been training on just such a mission.”
“Mrs. Parrish thinks she can keep mankind alive with a space colony?” Turcotte said. “For how long?”
“Indefinitely,” Leahy said. “But bear with me. That was not the final result. Remember I said three pronged? The third is connected. The Facility. A closed ecological system that is self-sustaining. We’ve been working on that for a long time.”
“Where is it?” Turcotte asked.
“Not far from Dreamland and where I am,” Leahy said. “We used data from the early Biosphere projects and fine-tuned it using Ethos. We built our first biosphere twelve years ago. We’re now on version four-point-oh.”
“Does it work?” Yakov asked.
“Yes.” There was a pause. “The Facility was designed for six-thousand-two-hundred-and-fifty people.”
“You’ve switched back to ‘they’,” Turcotte noted.
“That’s because I don’t agree with Mrs. Parrish’s Strategy,” Leahy said. She sighed. “You can’t replace the Earth. No matter how self-sustaining a Ceres or Mars colony might be, it’s not Earth. We live on this planet. So the Strategy doesn’t end with a colony.”
“Where does it end?” Turcotte asked.
“Coming back to Earth,” Leahy said.
Yakov spoke up. “I don’t understand. Taking five thousand people from the planet isn’t going to change any of those things.” He thought about it. “Is the plan to come back in a couple hundred years, after civilization implodes?”
“No,” Leahy said. “That has several problems. T
oo many things can go wrong in the meanwhile. Also, if the environment changes so drastically due to climate change, it’s going to take more than a hundred or two hundred years to revert. The Strategy, the Myrddin Strategy, is more extreme.” Leahy rubbed her forehead. “The Strategy had to adapt once the Airlia were knocked out of the picture. Once the mothership became available.”
“That’s going to be your colony,” Turcotte realized. “The mothership.”
“For a couple of years,” Leahy said. “Yes. As we speak it’s being loaded with pre-positioned supplies. There will be enough supplies it doesn’t need to be self-sustaining although the plan is to start out right away to be a closed system.”
“And then?” Turcotte asked.
“The third prong. The Strategy was to cleanse the planet after going off-world.”
“You said that word before.” Turcotte glanced at Yakov. “What do you mean ‘cleanse’?”
“Exactly what the word means,” Leahy said. “Wipe it clean of humanity and reboot. That will solve almost all the foreseeable doomsday problems: climate change, nuclear war, pandemic, over-population.”
“How?” Turcotte demanded.
“Remember the Mission?” Leahy asked. “The virus it was preparing?”
“It did more than prepare,” Turcotte said.
“The Strategy, certain scientists, biologists,” Leahy amended, “were working on something like that. Fast, airborne and very lethal.”
“Hold on,” Turcotte said. “Wait one damn second. You’re saying the plan is to wipe out everyone, everyone, once these people go up into space? Every person on the planet?”
“Yes. The biologists had not yet come up with something they considered effective. But we knew that Vampyr had accumulated three, top-secret, man-made biological weapons. Each one capable of causing an extremely lethal pandemic. So deadly that the governments that made them, the US, Russia and Japan, banned them and destroyed all samples. Even the Parrish’s couldn’t get a version. But Vampyr got his hands on them. And now, Mrs. Parrish has them. She plans on releasing them. She calls the project the Danse.”
“The what?”
“The Danse. From the Danse Macabre. The dance of death.”
“She’s nuts,” Turcotte said.
Leahy shook her head. “Sadly, she is very practical. It actually is a logical plan. Was, I should say.”
“How does the appearance of the Swarm change that?” Yakov asked.
“The Earth is no longer viable either short or long term,” Leahy said. “The Swarm arrival makes the pandemic rather unnecessary, doesn’t it?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “That is why I brought Nosferatu into this. The island you left them at in Puget Sound is where the viruses were. He’s tracking down where they are. That is part of the Strategy Mrs. Parrish has hidden even from herself, thus it’s hidden from me also.”
“You were going along with this?” Turcotte demanded. “Wiping out everyone on Earth?”
“No,” Leahy said. “I told you; I split a long time ago from the Myrddin. But I had to pretend to be part of it in order to change things.”
“Why did we leave Nosferatu and Nekhbet there if its no longer important?” Turcotte asked.
“Do you want that crazy Undead woman hanging around?” Leahy said.
“I think you’re nuts,” Turcotte said. “You and Parrish.”
“We believed in the Facility,” Leahy argued. “The space colony. Surviving aboard the mothership. But when we learned the rest, we knew we had to stop her. But, we also had to take into account the parts of the Strategy that made sense. Keep that. I’ve used the Tesla to do a different version of the Strategy.” She looked down for a moment, then back up. “It has been a very difficult balancing act. Now, it is all rushing toward a conclusion. Mrs. Parrish absolutely needs the ruby sphere. We all need it. That was only a minor possibility in the Strategy until recent events. Now it is the most critical component. We die without the sphere and the mothership. No matter what you feel or hope, Earth is doomed. You are our only hope.”
WARDENCLYFFE, SHOREHAM, NEW YORK
Reuben Shear stood in front of the door leading to the spiral staircase and the underbelly of Wardenclyffe. He had his gun in hand, but it hung at his side.
“If anyone else wants to try the tunnels, you can. But the odds are against you.”
A couple of people had already died attempting to make a run for it, trying to escape underneath the surrounding military. Those following had heard their screams as they broke through the floor traps and were impaled. The number of intersections and options caused even the most mathematically challenged among the techs to understand it was futile.
Several displays showed the inbound Battle Core and the autopsied Swarm body in Russian hands, adding to the sense of panic.
“We’re safe for the moment,” Shear said. “The shield is holding steady and power consumption from the reactor is good.”
“It’s the Ancient Enemy!” one of the women yelled. “It’s going to destroy everything. What about the Strategy? What about the Mothership?”
“The mothership is at Area 51,” Shear said.
“But we’re here,” the woman pointed out. “Will Mrs. Parrish stop by and pick us up? And where is Professor Leahy? Why did she abandon us?”
Shear went to Leahy’s station. “The Ethos link is dark. I’ve tried rebooting but we’re blacked.” He put the gun on the counter next to the keyboard.
“What are we going to do?” the woman demanded.
“Wait,” Shear said.
“For what?” someone else demanded.
“I don’t think this place is going to be a high priority to the military for much longer. Let’s see if we can figure out how that field is generated so we can turn it off when we need to escape.”
THE ASTEROID BELT
The Asteroid Belt had taken a small toll: three scout ships en route to Mars and two heading toward Earth were gone.
The Core was in the Asteroid Belt. The bow shield obliterated the smaller asteroids in its path. The few larger ones that made it through impacted on the hull, blasting craters of various sizes, but none deeper than twenty meters, damage that was easily absorbed.
A new wave of ships were launched. Warships with a unique mission. Each one had multiple ‘targets’: asteroids rich in desired elements. Unlike the scavenger ships farming the Kuiper Belt, these warships’ task was different; to scan and catalogue the target asteroids. If appropriate, then they would give the asteroid a push toward Mars. Given the thin atmosphere on the fourth planet, they would impact with relatively little degradation. On the way out of the system, if certain elements had not been fully recouped from reaping the third planet, the Core could pause at Mars and easily scoop up what was needed from the impact craters.
It was simple and efficient.
While the Core was scanning the Belt as it passed through it began to pick up minute traces of something unique. Bits and pieces, almost insignificant, but indicating a pattern.
A pattern the Swarm had discovered before. Given this system’s formation dated back 4.6 billion years, and the inner planets not long after that, there was a long stretch of time for the formation of intelligent life, establishment of at least one civilization, if not more and then destruction.
Long ago, very long ago, but not so much on a cosmic scale, there had been intelligent life in this star system.
If the Swarm could shrug, that would be the reaction to this information.
It didn’t care what had been here.
It cared what was here now for the reaping.
THE CANAAN OPTION
DREAMLAND, TEXAS
Maria’s job was to parse the significant from the insignificant out of the massive data stream that was feeding into the Strategy. Ethos did much of that, but primarily in terms of projections and decision points. With the steady, monotone computer voice whispering into her ear, Maria had to be able to pick the nuggets as they occurred and give
them to Mrs. Parrish.
Maria leaned close to Mrs. Parrish and spoke in a tone she could achieve where only the person she was talking to could hear. “The VLBA has picked up smaller objects emerging from the Asteroid Belt, Mrs. Parrish.” Her fingers were sliding over her flexpad. “Scout ships.”
Mrs. Parrish raised her voice so the others in the control center could hear and obey. “Trajectory on the scout ships?”
There was a buzz of activity.
Mrs. Parrish didn’t look at Maria when she addressed her assistant. “Any indication where Leahy has gone?”
“No, ma’am.” Something else came through the feed. “Visual via McDonald Observatory has picked up a new object appearing on the surface of Mars at Cydonia.”
“Put it on the main screen,” Mrs. Parrish ordered. She smiled as she saw the ruby sphere. “Excellent. Excellent. So we know with one hundred percent certainty it’s there.”
“The concern,” Maria whispered, “is why has it appeared? The Airlia must have learned the Swarm Battle Core is inbound before we did. This is a response to that. The most likely reason is—“
Mrs. Parrish knew the possibilities. “Self-destruct. Or it can be used as a weapon. Perhaps to supplement the power from the solar array.” She nodded. “Forward this information to Major Turcotte along with our suspicions.” Her voice cracked like a whip as she addressed the room. “Destinations for the Swarm scouts?”
“Mars and Earth,” one of the techs replied.
“ETA Mars?” Mrs. Parrish demanded. “Before or after the Fynbar arrives?”
The tech was ready. “The Fynbar will have a small window before the first Swarm scout arrives. We’re also picking up odd activity in the Asteroid Belt. It appears numerous asteroids are being redirected. Toward Mars.”
“The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Heinlein,” Maria said. “People on the moon literally threw rocks at Earth. Given the gravity well they became—“
Mrs. Parrish cut her off. “This doesn’t make sense.” She glanced at the right flexpad, which was pulsing with the new data, adjusting. She noted a significant adjustment in projections based on the trajectories of the scouts and the Core. She stood and raised her voice. “There has been a change in Exodus. The window has been shortened. There isn’t enough time for the mothership to come here. We’re prepared for that. We will begin implementing the Canaan option. A timeline is being generated and transport is en route. As promised, we are picking up your families and will be moving them to Area 51. We, here, will be the last to relocate, and will wait until the new command center aboard the mothership is on line.”