The Dead Room Trilogy

by Stephanie Erickson

  Approximate year, 2346

  Lehman dreaded having to tell the others what had happened. Not only did they lose all that wood, and time, but they’d also lost a man.

  Tristan said the further out to sea they got, the more the sand bags shifted as the boat rocked, making them unstable. They hadn’t thought to tie things down. After all, they were enclosed in the belly of the ship, so where could they go? Once the shift happened, they couldn’t fix it fast enough, and the weight was like a runaway freight train. The man in the back got his foot caught when the ship tipped too far, and it was all downhill from there.

  “How do we move forward?” she asked, shivering and struggling to breathe. Her lungs burned, as if she were still trapped in the ship, looking at the face of that man.

  She’d seen a lot of dead bodies over the years, carrying each one to the pyre faithfully. But this man, so recently gone, spooked her. His life hadn’t been given willingly—it had been taken from him by their quest for the mainland. And suddenly, she wondered if it was all worth it.

  She sighed, doing her best to shake off those kinds of thoughts. She couldn’t take them to Mattli and Mason. They would look at her like she had six heads. They were too deep into this now to be having regrets. She just had to find a way to break the news to them.

  But before she did, she wanted a game plan for how they would move forward. “Perhaps a simpler approach. Something more like the rafts we did earlier. But with some added stability. Maybe an arm like some of the catamarans we saw in the library?” They’d spent days studying the books in Mattli’s library looking for inspiration for something that would be stable, as well as large enough to carry what they needed.

  “Fine,” Tristan said, a bit of a ghost of himself.

  “Tristan?”

  He looked straight ahead, but he didn’t respond as they sat next to each other on the beach. Despite the fact that they were both wrapped in blankets, along with ten or so other men scattered around, his lips were still blue. She imagined hers weren’t much different, but she wasn’t feeling the cold. All she could feel was the desperation she’d felt from seeing that man.

  “He had a family, didn’t he?” she asked.

  “Yes. He did. A good family. They were a good match. They loved each other.”

  “Of course they did,” she said, feeling even sadder. “I will tell his match tonight, although she may already know by then. First, I must speak with Mason and Mattli. We need some kind of game plan for how we intend to overcome this.”

  Only then did Tristan turn to her. “Overcome this? Someone died because of me. How am I supposed to overcome that?”

  She unfolded herself from her blanket cocoon and put a hand on his shoulder. “He didn’t die because of you. He died in pursuit of the mainland. Nothing more, nothing less. We are all in pursuit of the mainland. If we die trying to get there, so be it. But hopefully, the future generations will thank us.”

  He glared at her. “The same way we thanked Bennett Ashby, the complete fraud? We’re no better than him,” Tristan said, getting up and storming off.

  Lehman was on her own. Her mind spun wildly as she walked over to where Mattli’s crew was working on the windmill. He was smiling widely when she approached.

  “Good news?” she asked, trying to hide her despair. She’d managed to ditch her blanket and change clothes on the way over, but her hair was still wet. She hoped he wouldn’t notice, at least not right away. The cold air was making her ears ache as her hair touched it, and she pulled her collar around her neck as she walked toward him.

  “Yes. We’ve made some excellent progress today. We can actually store energy. I think this will work for the EMP. I’ve given Mason the go-ahead to build their prototype, and by the time they’re done, we should be able to connect the two.”

  “That’s wonderful news,” she said, a little more flatly than she meant to. It made Mattli stop and look at her. Really look at her.

  “You look terrible. Has something happened?”

  “Actually…” She wasn’t sure where to begin—with the rations or the man. “We’ve had a rather tragic day.”

  “Tragic?” He stood up from his seat at his desk and walked around to face her.

  “We’ve lost another ship.”

  “Damn it. I didn’t anticipate this part of the equation being this difficult.”

  “There’s more.”

  He eyed her. “More?”

  “We’ve lost a fair bit of wood. As you know, we have a finite amount of resources when it comes to building on the island. It will be a problem before long, if we don’t get this right soon.”

  “Not time to worry about that yet, Lehman. We can plant new trees. There’s enough, for now. Let’s just try to get it right next time.”

  “There’s one thing more.”

  He folded his hands over his chest, waiting for her to go forward.

  “A man…” She gulped, trying not to see his face floating next to Mattli as she spoke of him. “He got trapped as the boat sank. We tried to free him, but…”

  “Someone died today,” Mattli said, not as a question, but a statement. He sighed deeply. “It was bound to happen eventually, but I didn’t expect it to come from your team. Mason’s team is dealing with much more dangerous properties. But the sea is nothing to take for granted, that’s for sure.”

  He was so matter of fact about it. Her mouth hung open as she looked at him, and then she turned her eyes to the dead man’s ghost standing next to him.

  “He had a family. A loving family,” she said, as if that would make him feel something for the man they’d lost.

  “I’m sure he did,” Mattli said, watching her.

  But she wasn’t looking at him. She was looking at the ghost.

  “He had blue eyes. Dark blue eyes.” It was barely above a whisper.

  She didn’t realize she’d started to shake until Mattli put his arms around her. She couldn’t fall apart. She wouldn’t fall apart. Not here. Not now. But despite her fiercest instructions, the tears came, and once the dam was broken, there was no stopping them.

  Mattli held her for a long time while she cried.

  “His death is on my hands, Mattli,” she said as she pulled away from him, hoarse from sobbing.

  “It’s on all of our hands, isn’t it?” It wasn’t what she’d expected him to say. No… Oh, no, it isn’t, Lehman. He went into this knowing the risks. You couldn’t have known. Or… It was just an accident. Nope. Complete and total acceptance right along next to her. It was her fault, but it was his and Mason’s fault too.

  Somehow, it was exactly what she needed—to know she wasn’t in this alone.

  “Are we doing the right thing?” She chanced a look at him. He didn’t smile or offer anything reassuring.

  “Right and wrong are loaded words when you’re talking about changing the world, Lehman. We don’t have all the information. We’re scrambling for it, trying to put the pieces together. If we had them all, we might make different choices. But we don’t, so all we can do is the best with what we’re given. I expect that’s what you were doing, and that’s what he was doing. At some point, you’ll have to come to accept that.”

  She nodded, wondering if she’d ever leave his ghost behind, or if he’d always be there, floating in front of her.

  Mason didn’t take the news as well as Mattli did, but he was also new to this. He hadn’t had to make as many hard choices as Mattli had. He hadn’t sacrificed lives for the greater good before.

  As he sat in the dead room with Mason while the others worked around them, he suggested going topside for some fresh air. The expression on Mason’s face was unreadable, and for someone who was usually so filled with emotion, Mattli didn’t think it was a good sign.

  While they walked the path outside, Mattli hoped it would calm Mason’s nerves.

  “Listen, it’s hard to make sacrifices.”

  “Mattli. Don’t. Sacrifices come in the form of my time, my comfort
, food, shelter, and things like that. Not people’s lives.”

  He ignored Mason and kept talking as they walked. “The most difficult decision I ever made was sending you and Ashley off to the mainland. I knew we were sending lambs off to slaughter. And I even told Alkoff as much while we watched you paddle away.”

  He turned to look at Mason, who was kicking the ground in front of them as he jammed his hands in his pockets. The snow was getting deep on either side of the muddy path. They’d walked it so much lately that the snow couldn’t settle on it.

  Mattli drew his robe around him more tightly, trying to keep the cold out. “But he didn’t see it that way. Ashley had gotten herself into a bit of a predicament among the elders. We thought if she didn’t come back, we’d at least offered her a chance at survival. Where if she’d stayed here, you know as well as I do, she would’ve died eventually. But out there, that was where she belonged.

  “But the more I justified it in my head, the more wrong it felt. Sending Ashby’s heir out into the wilderness without any training at all. Did you know every hundred years or so, a scout was trained to go to the mainland? They’d spend their whole lives training on survival, how to maneuver a canoe, and how to navigate.

  “But Ashley—the heir to this island’s creator—we just cast her to the wind. It seemed like a tremendous injustice.”

  He chanced a glance at Mason. His mouth was clamped tightly shut, his lips making a fine line.

  “But I knew it was for the good of the island. If you came back with news, it would be the end of our way of life as we knew it. That’s all Ashley ever wanted anyway.”

  They walked in silence for a few more paces until Mattli stopped and turned toward Mason. “This pursuit of the mainland is what she would’ve wanted. And although she would be saddened by our most recent sacrifice, she would carry on.”

  Mason frowned, but he eventually nodded. “You’re right. I know you’re right. I just, I didn’t think if someone died, it would be one of the fishermen.”

  “I know.” Mattli nodded fervently. “I thought it would be one of yours to be honest.”

  “Thanks a lot, man.”

  “Working with electricity is a lot more risky than building boats, Mason. You must admit.”

  “We don’t have electricity yet,” Mason pointed out.

  “You will. Soon.”

  20

  May, 2025

  Once they were in Hollywood, they quickly went to the site. But Ashby didn’t have his laptop or anything to help him understand the code. So Mendi went and got one from a nurse’s station, and they set to work.

  They toiled for hours in the containment room, which was absolute torture. It was a small space, barely big enough for two men. It had no windows and was lined with dark black metal, making the room feel smaller and darker. A single recessed light illuminated the space, and a vent in the ceiling kept the air fresh. That was it. There was nowhere to put the computer as they worked, so Ashby sat on the floor Indian-style while he directed Mendi what to do, which wire to secure next, and what connection to check and double-check.

  But nothing seemed amiss. There was no sign of the mystery code he’d found at the meltdown sites. As if whoever had put it there hadn’t made their way to that particular site, yet. After six hours of searching, they sat back facing each other, leaning against the black walls, their knees overlapping in the small space.

  Ashby rested his head against the material that was supposed to protect the human race from his creation.

  “Maybe it’s an anomaly,” Mendi said.

  “After three instances?”

  “It’s a stretch.”

  “Maybe this site is the anomaly,” Ashby said, fearing the worst.

  “Was there anything left of the containment sites at the other hospitals? Can we go there and see what the issue was?”

  Ashby looked at Mendi, trying to think. “I think there was. I haven’t been over there to be honest. That PR woman recommended I stay away.” Jen had been calling and texting all day, but he was busy trying to save the damned world. He couldn’t deal with a PR problem at that point.

  “I think it would be good to take a look,” Mendi said.

  “Agreed.” Ashby typed in a quick search to Google, and then plotted their course. “It’s around sixteen hours to CSMC from here. If we leave now and stop tonight for a few hours, we could be there by tomorrow night. Get to work straight away on Wednesday.”

  “Let’s go,” Mendi said.

  Ashby texted Ashley quickly, to make sure she’d gone to the island as instructed, and then followed up with Hope, who put him off. He hoped she wouldn’t keep doing that for long. Ashley assured him she was safe and enjoying the sun. She asked when he would be there.

  Soon, was all he could say at that moment. He hoped he would get there at all.

  The drive to CSMC was quiet. They couldn’t talk about their personal lives anymore. Ashby didn’t want to know, nor did he have much to tell.

  About four hours outside of their destination, a rather disturbing report came over the radio.

  “An incident similar to those at CSMC and Shands is playing out at Northwestern in Chicago as we speak. Authorities are struggling to gain control of the situation, as the first electromagnetic pulse didn’t prove to be one-hundred-percent effective,” the male reporter stated.

  “How can that be?” Mendi asked.

  “I have no idea. Maybe too many of the bots got out of range? Or the EMP wasn’t strong enough? Northwestern had a lot of bots. Not as many as Shands, but still. A lot.”

  Ashby pulled the car over. “What should we do?”

  Mendi stared at his friend. “What do you mean? Chicago is a long way away. Days. By the time we could get there, it will be settled. I think we should stay the course. We’re hours from CSMC. Let’s get there and get to work. If we can find an anomaly, maybe we can prevent the next one.”

  But, as the hours went by, they remained glued to the radio as the situation escalated. For some reason, the authorities couldn’t get ahead of the bots this time. People were dying left, right, and center, but not only that, the power had gone out at the hospital. Once the bodies were consumed, the bots moved on. It wasn’t a good sign.

  “They need to get the bots under control before it escalates further,” Ashby said.

  “You don’t have to tell me. Is there someone you can call?”

  “No. But the right people know what to do, and it’s probably already done. If you ask me, they should start deploying the airships, if they’re even done building them by now.”

  “How long ago was your meeting?” Mendi asked.

  “A few months, I guess.” It seemed like a lifetime ago. A lifetime since the shit hit the fan, and even longer since things were normal, and he was nothing but a poor scientist trying to make a miraculous discovery. Now, the discovery seemed more like a curse than a miracle.

  “That’s not enough time.”

  “Maybe. You don’t know the military. They’ll get it done. The rest of the world, I’m not so sure about.” It was just a general feeling he had after his meeting, and nothing more, but it gave Ashby hope.

  They tried to ignore the declining news as they pulled into CSMC, but it was no use. The containment room was marked off with yellow DO NOT CROSS tape. But, once they’d shown who they were, they were given full access to the room.

  All doors were opened, and no bots remained inside.

  “If I could just get a history on the programming and see what happened, maybe I could see the mystery code in action.” Ashby mumbled as he tried to get to work.

  But he kept one ear on the radio, making it difficult to concentrate.

  There hadn’t been any record of any kind of code in months, not since the initial incident, of course. The program had been eliminated after that, and the hospital had been on a skeleton crew for weeks afterwards, while they tried to make sure the area was indeed secure. Ashby tried to tell them it was, particula
rly after deploying the EMP. He had no idea where the bots were, but they would be useless, so it didn’t much matter. People were scared though. They’d been attacked rather suddenly, so they took a cautious approach, and Ashby supposed he couldn’t blame them for that. Frankly, he was surprised the containment room hadn’t been disassembled completely. He hadn’t had time to ask about it, and he imagined they hadn’t had time to deal with it.

  After over an hour of searching, he finally found some data that he could work with. A log of the last day. Just as he was opening it, the announcer on the radio said something that made his heart stop.

  “Chicago has gone dark. Citizens are being told to go. No specifics are being given—just for everyone to get out. Go anywhere but there if you want to survive. It’s a bad situation down there.”

  “Oh my God,” Mendi said.

  Ashby didn’t respond. He swallowed hard and called Ashley.

  “Hey, Dad. What’s up?” she said cheerfully.

  “Are you watching the news?”

  “No, why?”

  “Chicago has gone dark, because of the bots. They’re eating the city alive.”

  “What?” she asked, a little bewildered. Ashby didn’t know how much she’d kept up with the news, and even if she had, they’d blamed everything but the bots, so he knew she wouldn’t make the connection.

  “Ashley, listen carefully. Stay on the island. You will be safe there.”

  “Mom. What about Mom?” she said, slightly panicked.

  He hesitated. She’d betrayed him. But did that mean she deserved to die? No. “Call your mom. Tell her to join you. Bring what she can. You might be there for a while.”

  “Okay, Dad. Thanks. When are you coming?”

  “I don’t know. Soon, I hope. I’m trying to stop this before it can go any further. Then you girls can go home and move on.” He felt like the more times he said it out loud, the more it had to come true.

  “Okay, Dad. Call me soon.” She sounded clearly concerned about him. He imagined her clinging to the phone, standing on their porch with the sound of the crashing waves in the background. He let out a breath. No matter what, she would be safe.