“How will you take this place?” Yulin asked.
“I know what we won’t be doing. No pitched battle. No standup fight at the gates—there are two—or the wall. This isn’t the iron age, and I can’t afford to lose people in a senseless fight. I’m not going to win a Pyrrhic victory—sorry, old reference. He was a leader willing to take massive casualties in order to win.”
“Oh, we know that name, but he’s been replaced by Elemurr. He ruled an empire to the east in what was Kentucky, some centuries ago. There’s nothing left of his empire, thanks in part to him.” She touched the screen and a picture, taken at a distance, came to life. It was a man in his forties, tall and arrogant, cowering behind a group of female archers chained to his wagon. He was pointing forward even as a storm of arrows and spears punched into forward ranks of his men, who were hobbled like horses at a distance from his enslaved archers.
“What an asshole,” I spat.
“Yes, he was, and now he’s dead, and the only people who remember him use his name as a curse,” Yulin said. “Your reaction tells me you want victory, but in a reasoned manner. This is what we do here, and what my sister excels at.”
“We don’t have the luxury of cheap blood, for many reasons,” Aristine said.
“I’m glad to hear that,” I said, my mood made better by their combat style and the excellent wine we drank. “When are you going to tell me what you want of us, by the way? We had a saying in my time. There are no free lunches, or in this case, dinner and combat plans.”
“Oh, but some things are free, especially when goals align. Like now,” Aristine said, tilting her head to consider me. “I’ll get right to the next point, because we’ve got a lot to do. Have you thought about how you’re going to secure your legacy?”
“Legacy? No. By your measure of time, I just got here. I’m trying to make buildings that don’t fall over, not statues to myself,” I said.
“Not that kind of legacy. A family, and someone to carry on your work,” Aristine said.
I sat in stunned silence. “Children?”
“Yes, children. A lot of them, unless you plan on recruiting endlessly from The Empty. Is that in your model?” Aristine asked.
I leaned forward, getting my bearings. “For one thing, this is now officially the strangest date of my life. For another, and you’ll have to help me out here—with ‘bots in my blood, can I even reproduce?” I asked.
“You can,” Yulin said. “We can, so it makes sense that you can as well.”
“So your people have ‘bots? Does it make your lifespan longer?” I asked.
“Than people during your first life? Absolutely. Fewer diseases, too, and better hearts, lungs, and we have a much more stable brain chemistry. But we don’t have the luxury that you do of bringing outsiders into your extended family, so to speak,” Aristine said.
The truth hit me like a truck, and I felt myself grow still as the enormity of what they were asking became clear. “You want my DNA, because there aren’t enough of you. Noble and Yulin are related to you. You’re all related down here, to some extent, aren’t you?”
“We are, and we need to stay ahead of the need for new blood. New DNA, to be accurate, and we’ve reached a point where it’s become critical,” Aristine said.
“The Daymares. They aren’t just for fighting,” I said.
“No, at least, not the men. There are women who train as Daymares, but the population around us outside has been devastated by war, and Wetterick, and Kassos,” Aristine said.
“So you have an interest in the same things I do, just for slightly different reasons,” I said.
“Yes, but the same ones, too. Our original mission takes precedent, but we can’t succeed if we die out,” Yulin said. Aristine gave her a nod of agreement, and it was a touch sad.
I considered their request for a long moment, but the decision was easy, because we wanted the same things. Then I had another thought and felt myself smiling. “What are you looking for in a, um, donor?”
The sisters shared a look, but Aristine answered. “Healthy, intelligent men. If we have any preference beyond that, it’s their size.”
“Excuse me?” I said, involuntarily looking down at my groin.
“Not that,” Yulin said with a snort. “Height. Weight. Robust men. Intelligent men.” She quirked a brow at me. “Like you.”
“Like me. Hm.” I carefully put my cup down, then stood, held out a hand to Aristine, and pulled her to her feet. “Yulin, will you give us some privacy, please?”
Aristine coughed, then patted her chest before her face cleared of shock. “Oh. You’re serious?”
“Yes. Are you?”
Aristine gave a tiny nod to her sister, then extended a hand to mine, her eyes never leaving my face. She stood, and Yulin left, pulling the soft covering that served as a doorway behind. With a snick, the room became even darker, but Aristine led me unerringly to a room away from the main chamber. Inside, only a small globe of light cast a golden glow over half the room, the other part shrouded in a curious twilight. To my amazement, there were photographs and paintings on the wall of things I knew—images from my world, and the years after when I was asleep under the growing sands of The Empty.
“The St. Louis arch,” I said, staring at the picture. It sent a pang of loss through me, and I’d only seen it once, when I was a kid on a school trip. At the time, I’ been more concerned with a girl named Renee, but now, the arch seemed like a monument to everything we lost. “A whole world. Gone.
“We can rebuild it, Jack. Starting now,” Aristine said. She poured a drink from a bottle on the table by her bed, then made one for herself. She drank, throwing the rum back as if she was making ready for battle, which she was, in a way.
I drank mine, placing the cup with great care, then pulled Aristine to me. She was light in my arms, her long body like artwork, breasts pressed against me in soft confirmation of all that she was. I kissed her, tasting her lips, her breath, and the rum, a swirling mix that made me hard in seconds.
She leaned back, and I followed. Even in the low light, I saw something I had not expected.
She was nervous.
“You’re perfect,” I said, and I meant it.
“It’s been a while,” she said.
“Then I’ll go slowly.” I kissed her neck, then breasts, then worked my way down the flat expanse of her pale stomach before coming to a stop and flicking my tongue across her lips with a delicacy that made the muscles in her legs twitch in time. I went left, and right. I licked a long, firm line that parted her under my tongue, and then she began to shudder, her breath a tattered gasp that went on for a minute, her eyes rolling like a wild horse on the run.
I lifted myself to kiss her mouth, and she welcomed me in, pulling at my back with a desperate need made of duty and lust. We would be the future of her people, and she would be the ally for mine. I moved against her like the tides, letting her come again before I did too.
Then we did it again, but this time, there was no hesitation. Confident in her need, she pulled my mouth to her breasts, pushing against my head until I nipped gently at her swollen nipples, earning a soft curse somewhere between pleasure and pain. She came harder, easier, and with her eyes open, watching me as I released, and when it was over, she pulled me to her side and watched me with those glacial eyes, now warmed with the heat of our union.
“Can you sleep?” she asked.
“I could nap,” I said, feeling a slow smile on my lips. Aristine was different than my women in many ways, but there was a core of will that I could feel, even lying next to her there in the haze of pleasure.
Her face fell, and she pulled away. “Sorry, I—excuse me,” she said, then turned to face me, a bashful smile on her face. “I don’t know why I’m apologizing for a nature call after what we just did.” She waved a hand over the globe and the light died, then I saw her shadow go into the other room.
I slipped into that curious twilight men can find only after
eating a steak or having incredible sex. It isn’t sleep, and it isn’t being a wake. It’s better than both, and for some moments, I drifted, content and free of worry.
I woke to Aristine’s tongue flicking over my thigh, then going lower, slow and deliberate before she took me in her hand, sliding her mouth over me in a hesitant caress. She pushed her mouth down, tongue moving against the underside of my shaft, and I hardened in her mouth instantly.
Then her mouth pulled away, and I sensed her change positions, only to feel her hips straddle me, the heat of her taking me in to the hilt. She began to move like an ocean swell, a deliberate motion that dragged every silken inch of her walls along my length, up, and down, and back before starting all over again. It was a flawless performance, and she began to shake even as a column of lava grew inside me. I came with an explosive shout, pulling her to me for a lingering kiss. Her breath was sweet, and she pulled away, put me back inside her, and began riding again, hands on my stomach as if by sheer will she could make herself come immediately.
It almost worked.
In less than two minutes, I felt the orgasm brewing within her like an ancient fault line waking up, rumbling nerves and shortened breath above me that made my own need so intense I could no longer resist the slick pull of her. I came harder than ever, driving up without care as her hands dug into the muscles of my stomach, holding on for dear life as we finally collapsed in a flurry of deep breaths and spasming muscles.
She rose again, unsteady and pushing off me with a hand gone damp with sweat. I, unlike her, could not consider moving. I chose to re-enter the bliss of neverland, letting the darkness take me as I waited for her return. There was nothing about her that made me think we would not repeat our performance, and the thought of her pale body made me smile in the dark.
She came to me then, and I touched her face, feeling the lips curled in a satisfied smile.
“Thank you, General,” I said.
Her only answer was a soft laugh, and then we slept.
28
Morning didn’t break. It was a general hum, and I opened my eyes to see Aristine sitting on the edge of the bed, holding a cup of something hot.
“I know I didn’t propose marriage last night, but will you marry me?” I asked.
She narrowed her eyes and pulled the cup away. “Is this because of my body? Because you may have me again, if you like.”
“Partially. It’s the coffee you’re holding. Away from me, I might add, in kind of a cruel way,” I said, fighting the urge to groan. Caffeine. Glorious caffeine.
She put the cup in my hands and I sipped. There were no words. “Where in the name of the saints and angels did you get coffee?”
She waved at the Chain. “Micro-micro climates. We have beans in three areas, and they’re all augmented for maximum production. And caffeine, of course,” she added when I sighed again.
“This past day has shown me that there are a lot of things worth any amount of danger,” I said, and Aristine blushed.
“Come, let’s get to the floor. There are things to see, and I want to show you the control center, where we maintain our network,” she said.
I dressed, savoring my coffee like it was my last drink before I went to the gallows, then we descended to the floor, where people were moving about with a calm kind of purpose. I saw no less than ten kinds of berries, and in each patch of plants there was a small stake with a light on the top.
“What are those?” I asked, pointing to the nearest blinking light in a group of blueberry bushes that huddled against a massive oak.
“Inventory control. We have all of our food catalogued and tracked by a system, so we don’t lose crops. We try to keep them in the best locations, but sometimes they have their own plans,” she said. We walked a few meters, and she knelt, lifting a large leaf. Under the bush, there were dozens of mushrooms, their lobes a vibrant orange. “Hen of the woods. We don’t know how they got here, but they grow fast, they’re edible, and we decided to let some nature go its own way.”
It was amazing. We were in an artificial place, but it had the feel of a secret grove, like a place left untouched by people and just discovered that day. “You never told me about those tubes, up there?” I pointed to the distant ceiling, where the tubes wound their way along in serpentine curves.
“That’s where we’re going now. To see what they do, and why they’re so important,” Aristine said. Several people greeted us with friendly waves, but moved on. I got the feeling I was to be given the tour first, and grilled later.
The control center was halfway up the opposite wall, and we climbed a spiraling staircase with sections that had been replaced over time. Like the houses, the center had a porch, and large openings that were neither door nor window.
Inside was the new world.
“What is this?” I asked in a low voice. Several people worked at stations that only resembled anything I knew as a computer in the most remote way; they passed hands over screens that shimmered and danced like the surface of a pond. “Three dimensional screens. I’m glad someone finally did it.”
“And more,” Aristine said. “Everyone, this is Jack Bowman, leader of the Free Oasis. He’s my counterpart, as we discussed on the net, and he’s here to see how we water the garden. Be on your best behavior, won’t you?”
A ripple of laughter went through the room, and the closest person came up, hand extended. He was about my age, taller than me, thinner than me, and on the verge of being pretty. He wore the red and blue, but with an odd silver coil around one arm, connected to a small, oval device that looked worn and used.
“I’m Faynar, the lead tech on our saturation network. Welcome,” he said, shaking my hand vigorously. He looked delicate but had the grip of a farmhand, which I suspected he was. I wasn’t far off. “The tubes you’re seeing are the delivery system for our reclamation project topside.”
“Water? They’re for water?” I asked.
Faynar nodded, then waved me over to his chair. The screen shimmered as we approached, and he called up a series of images from beneath us, where the fish were being farmed. “Our water sources are stable, and deep. We use nanobots to engineer a self-repairing network of capillaries that carry water up to individual places—like the taproot of a tree, or a spring, or even a hillside that needs grass to remain free of erosion. By controlling the water from here, we assure the life up there of its best chance. As we expand, so does the network.”
I stared at the screen in wonder. We were doing the same thing in The Oasis, but with primitive means. I explained our system to Faynar and Aristine, who nodded in approval of our efforts.
“How far is it between Eden locations?” I asked.
Aristine pulled up a map with a wave. In blue lines, the Chain came to life before me, a series of long, imperfect rectangles connected by wide corridors that had to have spanned fifty to seventy meters. In all, the scale was easy to judge even before she told me, but I let her speak because it was her house, her rules.
“Each location is five square klicks, with an average distance of fifteen klicks between chambers. The gap between E4 and E5 is somewhat more at twenty klicks, with E1 and E2 being closer. The connector is just under twelve klicks,” Aristine said.
“Why are they not perfect in shape?” I asked. There were irregularities that seemed random and at odds with the general order around me.
“The rock doesn’t lie. During construction with the reactor-power rockeaters, the original crew ran into some unusually hard deposits. It was easier to go around,” she said with a shrug.
“This is beyond anything I imagined humans could do, and I saw the space program in action,” I admitted.
“I’m sure Andi feels the same way. Speaking of, why don’t you chirp her and see when she’s returning? I have something I’d like you to do, now that you understand what we’re about.”
I tapped my silver oval, “Andi?”
“Here,” came her instant reply.
“What
’s your ETA?” I asked. She sounded alert and happy.
“Oooooo,” she said. “I don’t know. Do I have to come back? It’s fun here.”
“Define fun, woman,” I said, smiling north, to where she was.
“Jack, they didn’t just keep going with research, they redefined some of the sciences. I’m not fucking around when I say we have a real shot at continental resurgence.” Her joy was unfiltered, and it was impossible not to be infected with her enthusiasm.
“Amazing. I think the same thing, and we’re just scratching the surface here,” I said, squeezing Aristine’s hand. “I’m going to ask Aristine to send you a schematic. Ask Noble if he can manufacture the item and get back here when you can. I’d like to roll out on Wetterick sooner rather than later. Don’t trust the bastard.”
“Neither do I. I’ll look for the info and be back soonest. Behave,” she said with a laugh, and cut our connection.
“What do you want to send her?” Faynar asked. I described my idea as his fingers dragged shapes, symbols, and data around until he completed a schematic, turning the screen in midair to show me. “What do you think?”
“Perfect. What’s next?” I asked.
Aristine licked her lips. “Feel like a little sunshine?”
“Thought you’d never ask. Take me to the Daymares.”
29
We went to the surface in style.
The elevator was carved more than built, a series of organic looking curves with elegant seating that lifted us in complete silence, stopping after less than a minute.
“That was like not moving at all,” I said as the doors opened onto a darkened hall.
“Air powered, runs off the venting system. As the elevator moves, it forces fresh air through a baffle, like a piston. It’s how we up mix things up to create breezes inside for pollination,” Aristine said with some pride.
“Your invention?” I asked.
“How could you tell?”
Future Reborn Box Set Page 57