It looked like she was combing through memory to tell me the story, and a jolt of recognition hit me. Missouri. The Arch. Had to be a bioweapon. I felt sick for a place that no longer existed, and grief came home to roost. I wondered if my ex-wife had died badly. She had been a quiet woman, prone to depression and loneliness. People like her wouldn’t have done well in a global crisis. No one would have done well.
“I want to know where else, but there’s something more important to me, Mira. When? Do you know when this happened?” I asked. I had to grieve for my world, and I needed a number.
“I don’t know. There are liars who say they know, but they tell fortunes and pretend to use Hightec like magic. It’s all a show of falsehoods. The only thing that truly matters is tomorrow, and surviving the night,” Mira said.
The bottom of my stomach dropped like I was thrown off a cliff. The night spun, then grew still. Bel sat up, and Mira took my hand. Everything I knew was dead. Ashes. Gone, buried under sand and forgotten things.
“How long were you trapped in the tech, Jack?” Bel asked from across the fire.
It took me time to compose myself, not from sadness alone, but wonder. I was dumbstruck by the slip between times, all while I slept because of an unscrupulous doctor and my own need for money. Neither could help me now.
“Depends on when the virus—or whatever it was—struck down my people, but I aim to find out.”
“You should let the dead stay buried. Move on and live,” said Mira.
I stared at her for a second. “My entire world is dead, but yours is struggling to breathe. From what I’ve seen so far, it ain’t much better.” My words fell like stones. Neither sister moved, silenced by the gulf of time that existed between us. I was another life form to them, as alien as if I had fallen from the stars.
They were quiet at that, then Mira took my hand again. Her grip was tight but kind and feminine, and I felt a second jolt in as many minutes, but this was far more welcome than the first. “We have to dig tomorrow, and we will continue to answer your questions if we can. I’ll take first watch. You need sleep, Jack.”
“Been sleeping. I’ll stand watch with you if that’s okay.”
She laughed, sliding closer to point into the sky. I followed her finger just in time to see a silver streak overhead. “The Travelers. Something left over from your people, maybe?”
I raised my brow. “A satellite still in orbit? That would be almost impossible. They came back to earth after decades, not centuries.” Thinking it through, I revised my opinion of the silent light that burned southward. “I thought sleeping my life away was impossible. I thought healing was a lie, and the end of the world was a fantasy. Who knows?”
She leaned against a section of fallen masonry, stretching her legs closer to the fire. With a metallic ring, she drew a long blade, the wicked edge gleaming in the firelight. “Tomorrow, we find you a weapon. You’ll need it. Can you fight?”
“I was a soldier,” I told her. When she lifted a brow, I explained. “Soldiers are good at certain things. We dig. We complain. We’re expert drinkers and, given the chance, we—” I stopped myself before I mentioned how fun we were in bed. Better to save that bit of info for another time.
Her smile was knowing. “Soldiers are all the same, no matter what world they come from. I’m a soldier too.”
I let my eyes linger over her body and knew she was right. Together, we listened to the night, pretending not to notice how close we were to each other as Bel slept under the wheeling stars.
4
Dawn broke, and I opened my eyes reluctantly. There was something soft touching me. Something warm.
It was Mira. She curled near me, Bel tucked behind her—both sleeping quietly. I’d heard Bel lie down as the night ended a half hour earlier, her watch complete. I let my eyes adjust to the dim light, watching sunlight begin to spill over the horizon. There were hills to the east, low and drab, a smear of dull brown rising from the endless dunes. The last stars fled while I stood, uncertain at first but growing stronger with each second.
I stepped out into the morning air, looking around for someplace to piss. “We have a winner,” I muttered, stepping over to a pile of rocks that looked like it would give me some privacy. I’d been naked yesterday, but old habits die hard. When I finished, I looked down at the rocks and stopped moving.
There was a brick. Next to it, another one, and then dozens more in the growing sunlight. I stood in ruins that I’d thought were mere rocks the day before, an idea blooming in my head with the new day.
“Feel better?” Mira asked, smiling through her tousled golden-blonde hair. She looked even better in the morning than the moonlight as I stood to admire her before answering.
“You could say that. These are bricks,” I said, pointing.
“Bricks covered in piss, but yes. And?”
“Fair enough. You found me there? Didn’t move the tube at all?” I waved at our camp, the walls glowing with sunlight at the top.
“Too heavy,” she said. A noise in the background gave me pause—Bel was awake. I decided to wait and explain my thoughts all at once.
“I thought so. I’m hungry and thirsty. Can we eat and talk?” I asked.
“Yes. We need to plan what happens next, but not just for us. For you,” Mira said.
Bel and Mira moved like a well-oiled machine, stoking the fire from embers to set meat and some kind of root to cook. They passed me the canteen, then picked up their masks, shaking out sand and cleaning every part of the primitive devices.
“Anything out here that won’t kill you?” I asked, taking a bite of jerky. It was just as good as the first time.
“You, we hope, but other than that, no. Everything kills. Everything eats,” Bel said.
“There are pack animals and small creatures that hide, but the Empty is a hard place even on the best day,” Mira said.
I pointed to the pile of bricks outside the walls. “I have an idea about that pile over there, and the rest of this place too. You found me right here, and the tube was buried, right?”
“Buried deep,” Mira admitted.
“Then this place is—I know this place. I know all around here too, as long as the earth hasn’t moved while I was taking my nap,” I said. I didn’t trust much around me, but I knew my sense of direction hadn’t gone away. “When you dig things up, what do you do with them?”
“Trade them, mostly,” she answered. “If we find something we can use, we’ll put it to work. The town has a trading hub where scavengers can offload goods, and then anything that’s useful can be sold in the square. No tech, just useful things, like blades or metal. Why are you asking?”
Her eyes shined brilliantly in the sun, like fresh-cut emeralds, and I wondered if there were other women like her in the trading post. Oversleeping through the end of the world might not be all bad if women looked like them.
I scuffed at the ground, prying up the remnants of a wide, flat turtle shell. It was sun-bleached and brittle, but it would do for what I had in mind. “Do you have something to write with?” I asked.
Bel handed me a stick of charcoal, wrapped in thin leather. “Use this if you’re mapping.” She understood my meaning and settled back to watch. Mira did the same, waiting to see what I was going to draw.
“We are here,” I scrawled a star in the center of the shell, then began making a series of lines and marks in an expanding map. It was crude but effective, despite being drawn from my memory. “This half of the clinic is supplies. We should dig there. Here are some other buildings that might be useful, but there’s no way we can dig through all of this in one trip. I know this place, know these streets—”
“Streets?” Mira asked, looking around at the howling wastes.
“Underneath us, yes. There’s a city here, and I can show you where to dig and why, if you explain what it is we want to sell,” I said.
“What we want to sell? We’re partners?” Bel asked. There was a hint of challenge in her v
oice as Mira merely watched.
“We are unless you want to waste your lives digging up old tires and trash. I’ll show you where to dig, and I’ll help with the digging. This is my city. This was my life. If I understand this world, I’ll make us rich, but you have to consider me a partner. I’m nobody’s shovel donkey.”
“What’s a donkey?” Mira asked.
“Stubborn animal, a beast of burden. In my time, it was also called an ass. You can ride it too," I told them.
Mira’s laugh was musical. “You can still ride an ass in this time too, but it might cost you if you go to the trading post.”
“Unless you can find a free ride,” Bel added.
I let a handful of sand run through my fingers, watching it blow away in the growing wind. “I don’t pay for rides. Never did, and I won’t be thawed out just so I can dig in the desert to support my next ride.” I felt my grin fade as Mira appraised me, looking at my arms and chest with a raw, unfiltered hunger.
“I didn’t say everyone had to pay. Sometimes you get to ride for free, if you can find the treasure,” Mira said.
I scored the shell, never taking my eyes from every inch of Mira’s lush body. She was long in the leg, sculpted everywhere, with a round ass and breasts that stood up and out like they regarded gravity as a charming suggestion. I watched her full lips, letting my gaze roam across the shape of her face when I wasn’t taken in by the perfection of her green eyes. “X marks the spot. Let’s dig, and you can tell me about your treasure.”
“Treasure looks better in the moonlight. For now, we dig,” Mira said, standing and brushing sand from her pants. “Where first?”
“The second half of the clinic, just over here. That’s where the doctor’s office was, and if this clinic is like any other Air Force facility, then there will be a safe,” I said.
“Air Force?” Bel asked, already holding a metal shovel. It was wide and well-made, with a handle wrapped in leather. Mira had two shovels of the same design, handing me one with a broad ring at the end. It was perfect for excavating sand. I guess they knew their business.
“My country had a huge force of warships, sailors, soldiers, airmen, and pilots too. Our military spanned the world, but this building was a research clinic; a place where they tested new ideas.” I sank the shovel into the ground. The blade went deep, cracking layers of impacted sand with ease. “I was one of those new ideas.”
“You won’t need a ship here,” Bel said, following suit. She wasn’t much of a talker, but she worked. Mira did the same, and in seconds, we were making fast progress in what had been Marsten’s office. I hoped I found the fucker’s bones so I could spit on them but kept that little sentiment to myself. I was in a future desert with two beautiful women and few answers. There was no reason to let a pointless grudge scare them.
“Are there ships? Not here, but anywhere?” I asked. I expected to get tired but didn’t. If anything, I was accelerating after a minute of digging, my muscles barely registering the effort. Mira watched me, leaning on her shovel with her perfect chest heaving after our first burst of intense effort. If she was gassed, I should be too, but I wasn’t. I filed that away, knowing that I wasn’t the same man who’d gone to sleep in the distant past, only to wake up and find the world died while I was hidden away in a forgotten military clinic.
Bel took a break, stretching with a groan. “Too much digging. Long trip.”
“How long have you been out here?” I asked, still turning rocky soil as I spoke.
“Two moons this week. We’ve had shit luck,” Mira said.
My shovel hit something, and I knelt to sweep the grit away. It was the edge of a wall, with a metal rim jutting out about an inch. Even at this angle, I recognized it instantly. A wall safe. Just the kind of place Marsten would keep the good stuff if he were using any kind of security protocols at all.
I took a final swipe with my shovel, clearing the entire safe to gleam in the sun. “Your luck just changed.”
“What is it?” Mira asked. She knelt next to Bel, both turning their heads to get a better look at the bland metal object.
“A safe. Place to hide things, and now I just need to get in,” I said, considering the problem. There was no power, and it was a mechanical and electric lock. “Show me your tools.”
Mira unrolled an impressive array of metal tools, stored in oiled hide. Some were old, some new, and a few made of other things, but they were all well-cared for and free of rust. I picked a cold chisel and an engineer’s hammer, the heavy metal head swinging easy in my hand. “Sometimes, every problem really is a nail,” I told them.
“Big nail,” Bel said.
“That’s why I picked a big hammer.” I didn’t tell them to shield their eyes because they wore goggles, but I did wave them clear.
The hammer nearly whistled in my hands, striking the chisel hard enough that it drove the point in and through the metal lip, sending sparks and metal shavings flying up in a bright flare. The smell of burned metal filled my lungs for a second, making me cough as part of the exposed wall collapsed ten feet away from the shockwave of my strike.
“Holy shit,” I said in the silence.
Mira looked at the hammer like it was a snake. “Well, that’s new.” Bel said nothing, but looked at the metal gash where the chisel had been.
I shook my hand, letting the tingle die. I was a decent athlete, with decent strength before. I was not Thor in another life, but I may as well have been throwing Mjolnir because the metal ripped under my blow like I was using a cutting torch. “Holy shit,” I said again because it seemed appropriate.
“Yes. Holy shit,” Bel agreed, smiling.
Mira picked another chisel, handing it over with hesitation. “Try not to melt this one?”
“I think the chisel is inside the safe, but I get your point. I’ll go at an angle,” I told them. When I lifted the hammer again, both women edged back without thinking. “Clear,” I said like I was detonating a bomb.
It was a bomb, of sorts. My second strike was harder than the first, and at a better angle. I sheared the entire safe face off in two pieces to reveal the interior shelves.
Even in the sun, I could see a winking blue light.
“Told you our luck was changing.” I reached for the contents and began handing them to Mira. There were three metal containers, flat and shaped like notebooks. I saw them before but never needed to protect anything, so I was careful as I placed them in her outstretched hands. She took them with a delicacy I didn’t know possible, clearing a flat rock to look them over with Bel. “One more thing. Is this the same blue light you saw in the tube?”
“Same. It was a small light, on the panel before we got you out. It went out after we tried to pry the lid. It’s the same color, only brighter.”
I reached in for the last object and held it up to the light. “Mira.”
“Yes?”
“Does anyone still use tech? At all?” I asked, never letting my eyes move from what I held.
“In the city. Even a little in the trading post, and a few people use the sunfans still,” she said.
“Sunfan?” I looked at her, unsure of the term.
“We have some on the cart. They fold out to drink light and can heat water, start a fire, even make old Hightec work again if they have enough time to charge. They break easily, and we don’t find many that still work. Very rare,” Mira said.
“Are they shiny? Like silver?” I asked. The object in my hand pulsed once again, a tiny blue light radiating from a port on the side.
“Yes, like glass, but very thin. As I said, hard to preserve, even for us, and we’re careful,” Mira said.
“Do the sunfans have cords?” I asked.
“Some do,” Bel said, watching the thing in my hand as it lit up again. It was black and unremarkable. A square that fit in my palm, but I suspected it was more important than we could imagine.
“Bring me one. Or two, if they can network. Can they be attached to each other?” I aske
d.
“They can,” Mira said as Bel moved off. “Bring the cleaner too.”
Bel moved with a furtive air, and I realized they’d been hiding their loot in plain sight. She pulled back a painted cloth, the pattern identical to everything around us. The cart was less than twenty feet away, in the middle of the ruins. She smiled when I nodded in approval at their stealth.
After rummaging carefully, she brought a leather tube, like an old map case. When Bel saw me looking, she held it up for inspection. “Keeps the fans safe. We pack them in silkweed.”
“How many do you have?” I asked. Mira unrolled the silvery panels in careful motions as Bel swept away sand from a flat piece of concrete, its surface pitted from wind.
“Four that are whole. One half that works a bit. They’re rare like I said, but they don’t seem to wear out,” Mira told me as she connected the solar panels with short black cords. “We find these cords everywhere. I think all of your machines used them.”
“Pretty much,” I agreed. They were thicker USB cables, clearly designed after I went down for my nap. I wondered how long the world had gone on before falling to shit. Judging by the solar panels, it couldn’t have been much. “How long do they take to charge the Hightec?”
“At this time of day? Not long. You could cook a meal and have a full charge by the time you’re done eating,” Mira said.
“Fast.” I nodded in approval as Bel completed the chain. “Connecting now. We’ll charge this and see what happens.”
“What is it?” Mira asked.
I considered my answer. It wouldn’t do to weigh them down with tech that had been dead for who knew how long, so I gave the simplest definition possible. “A memory core. It’s probably all of the data for whatever project I was a part of.”
“Data?” Bel asked.
“Facts. Stories. Records,” I said.
“Info,” Bel confirmed.
“Good to know some old terms are still around, but, yeah. Info works.” I made the connection and listened for the click, but instead, there was a magnetic tug. The blue light began to pulse steadily, rather than an occasional flash. “It’s charging. Now we’re going to need a way to read it. I don’t suppose you have a laptop?”
Future Reborn Box Set Page 3