Outland (World-Lines Book 1)

by Taylor, Dennis

  “Too goddam busy,” Monica commented. “Everyone has more than enough responsibility, without having to go looking for it. Give it a year, Richard.”

  “Are we still going to be here?” Pete asked. His plate empty, he’d finally come up for air.

  Monica shrugged, and motioned to Bill. Because he watched the satellite broadcasts more than anyone else, Bill had become the de facto expert on Earthside status.

  Bill lay back, supporting himself on his elbows. “I think we’ll be here a little longer than that, Pete. Things are still spiraling downwards Earthside, and they aren’t going to stop doing so for a while.

  “The ash from the eruption has halted most forms of transportation, which means no food deliveries, no fuel deliveries, and no travel. The only resources available to people are what’s within walking distance. Most urban areas don’t have much in the way of food-producing industries close by, so once the stuff in the supermarkets is used up, people will start migrating to look for food. That’ll be generally south, although south of Yellowstone is a bad bet.

  “One of the things I picked up a while back was that Mexico has closed their border to the American exodus, and yes, they’re being deliberately retaliatory. The announcement was just dripping with irony, slathered on with a trowel.” Bill rolled his eyes and shook his head in disapproval.

  “Anyway, the point is that there’s now a much smaller percentage of land on the planet that’s suitable for producing food, at the same time that our technical ability to sustain intensive high-yield agriculture is disappearing. Add to that the fact that there’s not much left in the way of fish and wildlife to harvest in our modern world, you can see where it’s going to go…”

  “Why can’t we bring people across to this side?” Phil asked.

  Phil normally didn’t get involved in these types of serious discussions, so there was a moment of surprised silence before Richard replied.

  “Well, we could, if we could get to them. The thing is, Phil, on Earthside probably everyone will have left Nebraska by now. In fact, within about fifteen hundred miles of Yellowstone, you could probably go days without seeing another human being. As Bill said, they’ve all migrated, looking for food—other than the occasional individual or family that we’ve managed to find.

  “In order to find people to bring across, we’d have to travel. East, west, north, whatever. And the highways are full of broken-down vehicles that people attempted to use in the middle of the worst ash-fall. So how do we get to California, for instance?”

  Phil thought about this for a few seconds, then sighed and hung his head.

  “And that isn’t the worst of it,” Bill added. People turned to him, apprehension on their faces.

  “There’s more?” Phil looked like he regretted asking.

  “Mm, yeah. See, the eruption will knock civilization back to a pre-industrial or early industrial level. Eventually, the ash will clear and ecosystems will start to recover, but then what? Humanity has been intensively extracting all the coal, metals, and oil from the Earth for a long time now. We’ve taken out the easily accessible stuff, the moderately accessible stuff, and in the last fifty years or so we’ve been attacking the deeply buried stuff that can only be gotten at with high technology.

  “When things start to recover, you’ll have a pre-industrial society with no access to any of the raw resources that we had lying around the first time around. Humanity will never recover on Earth Prime. There’s nothing left to recover with.”

  That was the final straw. Phil picked up his plate, got up, and headed to the cafeteria line-up for seconds.

  “Damn, that’s bleak,” Matt said.

  Bill sat up and rubbed his forehead. “Phil’s right, though. In the longer term, we have to go looking for people. We have to bring them across, and we have to start again on this side. There’s simply no other option.”

  Surveillance

  It was a long way from the trees to the camp in the distance, but Charles could make out the general activity, which included a lot of coming and going. Occasionally small groups would drive off on ATVs or dirt bikes.

  “We have to get some of those weapons,” Bluto said. “We’re outgunned right now. And almost out of ammo.”

  Charles considered. “I don’t see how we can get close enough to take them out by hand. I don’t want to tip off the camp with gunfire, and we can’t just set up way far away and hope they’ll show up to be mugged.”

  “Dirt bikes make noise,” Bluto commented.

  Charles looked surprised for a moment, then assumed a neutral expression. Bluto having ideas was unusual. Good ideas, even more so.

  “Good point, Bluto. We still have to wait for them to slow or stop, but I think the engines will drown out any noise from our pea-shooters.”

  ***

  Bluto shrugged, happy that he’d come up with an idea; and happier that it would allow him to shoot someone.

  Bluto could never be described by anyone as peaceful. He tended to view violence as a tactic of first resort, and he enjoyed his work. But with these kids, it was personal. They’d taken him down; that short little bitch had nutted him good. He’d had to move carefully for days after that. He’d been cold. He’d been rained on. He was always hungry. Andy was dead. And it was all their fault.

  “Little bastards are going to pay,” Bluto muttered. “They’re going to pay for Andy, they’re going to pay for what they did to me, they’re going to pay for making me sleep in a tree…”

  Charles glanced sideways at Bluto, sighed softly, and resumed watching.

  The two lay there most of the day, watching the activity, trying to identify patterns, looking for locations where one or two victims could be intercepted out of sight of anyone else.

  While they lay there, Bluto ruminated on the recent past. Remembered Andy being dragged down by a couple of large cats. Remembered running. Remembered being afraid— an emotion he hadn’t felt since before puberty. Remembered sleeping in trees, remembered eating random plants because he was so hungry. And Bluto felt his hate rising for the people who had done that to him. Oh, there’d be payback. Just wait…

  University

  The scavenging group slogged through the University grounds, hunched forward, heads down. There was no longer any detectable ash in the air, and recent rains had turned the ash on the ground into a gummy mess with the consistency of very soft clay. This had the desirable effect of preventing ash clouds rising from their footsteps, but made those same footsteps much more difficult. The three were sweating from the walk, and it was not a hot day.

  In fact, Ben couldn’t decide how to describe the current weather. He’d read a short story once entitled Becalmed in Hell. The only details he remembered were the title and floating in a gray mist, and that seemed to be very appropriate for the current conditions. The sky was gray—not from clouds, not from overcast—the sky itself looked gray, as if blue had been deleted from the color spectrum. A brighter patch indicated where the sun must be, but there was no texture visible there, either. The ash, caked onto everything, leeched the color out of the landscape and left nothing but a dull brownish-gray.

  The air was cool and still, but far more humid than seemed possible for the temperature. It seemed like Ben couldn’t get a breath, even though from moment to moment his body was getting enough oxygen.

  The group had been given a list of buildings to check out and report on. At the moment, they were making their way to the Scott Engineering Center. Ben had started humming the Volga Boat Song, but had given it up after a minute as too much effort. No one commented.

  ***

  Private Andrews watched the figures moving across the campus in the distance. He lowered the binoculars and turned to Timminson, who had cleared a space on a low wall and was sitting down. “They’ve got guns, but they’re not doing anything illegal. No real need to pursue, right?”

  Timminson grimaced. “I’m not moving for anything short of the crack of doom. Another crack of do
om, I mean.” They both grunted, neither having the strength to spare for actual laughter. “This is like a cold clammy version of hell.”

  Andrews made a note of date, time, location, and description of the subjects for his report. No evidence that these are looters. Pursuit not indicated.

  Food

  Joseph took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. He turned to the rest of the group. “Yeah, it’s a bit dangerous. We have to try, though. If there are any surviving pockets in there, it would be a major score.”

  They were standing in front of a one-time supermarket. As was all too common with this style of building, the roof had collapsed under the weight of the ash. The collapse had been uneven, rather than the entire roof pancaking, so the scavengers decided to check for any non-crushed pockets. Joseph and a few others were Earthside, providing an outside perspective via walkie-talkie to the other group, who were pole-camming the inside of the supermarket from Overside.

  Finally, a break. The radio crackled, then, “We’ve found an open area. Looks like loads of stuff. Definitely cans of food at least.”

  Joseph and his group whooped, and there were high-fives all around.

  A few minutes later, the six-foot gate opened up, and they walked through.

  ***

  It took hours to unload the open section. No one complained, though. They found not only cans and jars of food, but also flour, sugar, powdered milk, dried pasta, and boxes and bags of cereal. The crew was euphoric. The haul would mean weeks’ worth of meals free from chili, or months’ worth of meals with some added variety.

  Jacked Again

  Timminson looked at the empty shelves in disgust. They’d just spent close to two days carefully removing debris and shoring up portions of the building, trying to make it safe enough to enter. Now they were finally in the supermarket, the part that hadn’t been flattened anyway, to find that the shelves had been cleaned out. Every can, every package of food was gone. There were footprints all over the place inside, but there had been no indication outside that this cache had been discovered.

  Chavez will have a shit.

  ***

  “Again? We’ve been beaten to it again?” Chavez was, as expected, not taking it well. The corporal, when angry, got very quiet, and this made the other soldiers more nervous than a good old-fashioned cussing-out would have. Soldiers jockeyed to position themselves behind their fellows, so as not to be in immediate view.

  Chavez took a deep breath and spent a few moments fighting for control. “Whoever this group is, they have some technique or something that we don’t. More importantly though, they’re taking supplies that we need in order to keep our civilian charges alive. We are not keeping up with needs, and I’m tired of it. As of now, we’re on a looter hunt. Weapons hot, and if you happen to shoot one or two of them, I’m not going to notice. Clear?”

  Chavez glared around at the soldiers before continuing. “You see anyone, and I mean anyone, and you take them into custody. If they aren’t part of this group we’re looking for, and they aren’t looting, we can apologize and let them go. But no one gets away without scrutiny.”

  In the News

  Today we present a global scorecard. The regions that have stopped broadcasting and with whom there are no dependable communications include:

  - The United States of America

  - Eastern Canada

  - Mexico, Central America and the northern part of South America

  - Africa, except South Africa

  - The Middle East, except Iran and Iraq

  - China

  - Parts of southern Europe

  - South-East Asia

  ---

  We have credible reports that North and South Korea have executed a nuclear exchange. MI6 has confirmed the events via satellite surveillance. No word on the amount of damage or casualties.

  Ultralight

  “No wonder the company account was going down so fast.” Richard stood, arms akimbo, staring at one of two ultralight kits. The other kit had been opened and was halfway to becoming an actual aircraft. A half-dozen people were milling around, looking at instructions, arguing, and generally getting in each other’s way.

  “Mind you,” Bill answered with a smug look, “we never got around to paying for a lot of stuff I’d ordered. Yellowstone kind of interrupted the billing cycle, if you know what I mean.”

  “You are un-fucking-believable.” Richard tried to keep a straight face, but a grin kept breaking through. “So, do you know how to fly one?”

  “Um, I’ve taken lessons, but don’t have a lot of hours. A couple of these guys, though—” Bill indicated the group that was attempting to construct the aircraft. “— are experienced pilots. One of them has an Instrument rating, and several do gliders as well. I think we’re covered.”

  Richard nodded. “I noticed someone out with the bobcat this morning, plowing up an area outside the fence. That’s your doing, I guess?”

  Bill shrugged, palms up. “Runway. Gotta have one.”

  “Fine. Okay, Orville, but don’t kill yourself, all right?” Richard turned and walked away.

  ***

  “And, done.” Goro slapped the airframe.

  “All checked out?” Bill asked, walking around the aircraft.

  “Ready to fly, boss-man. You want to do the honors?”

  Bill shook his head. “I’m willing to forgo that honor, if you’re volunteering. Just a short proving flight, then come back. We’ll re-fuel, and I’ll go up with you.”

  Goro grinned. “You got it!”

  Goro Yoshida was their licensed pilot. It had been an offhand comment of his at one of the SciTech meetings that had reminded Bill about the ultralights. Goro had been bemoaning the likelihood that he’d never fly again, and Bill had done an immediate facepalm.

  “It looks like the bobcat’s finished flattening the runway,” one of the guys said.

  The group very carefully opened up the construction fence and moved the ultralight out of the protected area. Several people had shotguns, just in case.

  Once through, they moved to the runway. Goro did the required preflights, even though he’d done the same checks twenty minutes earlier, then climbed aboard and started it up.

  “Nice and quiet,” he said to Bill.

  Bill gestured toward the engine and propeller. “I never could stand the noisy ones that sound like lawn mowers. I made sure I bought a model that advertised a low decibel rating.” He stepped back, and motioned to Goro to take off.

  Goro gave him a thumbs-up, and taxied down the runway. The ultralight needed very little space to get aloft, and within seconds, Goro was circling Rivendell. People stopped what they were doing and pointed. There were several cheers.

  After a few minutes, Goro landed. They refueled and re-checked, then Bill and Goro climbed in. The take-off took only a little more runway with two people.

  As they did the obligatory circuit around Rivendell, Bill got his first chance to see Pleistocene Nebraska from the air.

  Holy crap on a cracker! Bill was sure he was gawking like a tourist, but didn’t care. Nebraska in Outland was hillier than Earthside. It also had a lot more trees, although not anywhere near the dense forest typical of the west coast. The trees were mostly deciduous, with what looked like maple, oak, and birch dominating, although Bill could see pine and cedar here and there.

  The important thing was to get a good overview of the land within a five-mile radius or so. Bill had instructed Goro to spiral outwards for as long as fuel allowed.

  Bill took picture after picture with the tablet, frequently adding voice annotations. He noted clear, flat areas for farming; hillier, open areas for grazing; and groves of trees that looked large enough to be able to handle a partial harvest. One of the principles that the new colony had already laid down was that they would not raze the environment like a cloud of locusts.

  Goro kept going off course to get a better look at various herds of animals, and Bill didn’t complain. The ultralight
was quiet enough that the animals didn’t notice them as long as the aircraft didn’t come in too low. Bill got excellent aerial shots of several mammoth family groups, a couple of giant sloths, and a huge herd of bison.

  Finally, Goro indicated that it was time to head back. Bill was disappointed that it was over so soon, and promised himself that he would get in the hours to become a proficient pilot.

  Scavenging

  “Yep. This is it.” Bill looked at the GPS display. He turned to Matt, who was sitting in his pickup with the engine idling. “Let’s set up.”

  Show time. Matt signaled to his passengers, turned off the engine, and everyone piled out of the truck.

  They unloaded the truck gate and the portal generator and set everything up.

  Meanwhile, Bill walked around with the pole-cam, watching the video feed. In a minute or so, he stopped. “This is inside the rental office right here. Ground level is close enough. We can open up here.”

  They assembled the truck gate, moved it into position, and Bill powered up the portal. There was the usual blurring, then they saw the inside of the Home Depot rental office. Bill walked around and looked at the other side of the gate, which showed the inside of the office in the opposite direction. He grinned and shook his head. “That is so cool!”

  They’d previously discussed strategy and duties. It took less than fifteen minutes to pull everything through the gate. People returned through the gate, laden down with equipment.

  On the Outland side, Matt watched people pop out of the gate from both sides, walking in opposite directions. That’s just wrong. It’s actually making me dizzy.