Wine of the Gods 1: Outcasts and Gods

by Pam Uphoff

  "Thorne, you've been eating too many of your mama's cookies. Period." Wolf eased him down in the shadow of a slab of rock and sat down beside him.

  A faint whimper answered him.

  "Let's try some water, shall we?"

  Thorne got some down and stopped looking quite so pathetic. "Tracer." He grabbed for the canteen.

  "Took it out of your shoulder. Shocking abuse of my favorite knife. They lost our trail after that."

  "They'd better have." Hays growled coming up beside him.

  "Ah, there you are, Sarge. I was beginning to think I was going to have to tote Thorne all the way myself."

  "I ought to make you." His growl sounded relieved though.

  Snake ran his instruments over Thorne and declared him clean.

  Another forty kilometers and the mini submersible crawled onto the barren shore of the arctic ocean barely long enough for them to get onboard.

  They ate their way through everything onboard. Thorne nibbled on some crackers, then just put his head down and slept. Wolf slept too. Twelve hours later they transferred to a proper sized submarine, and three days later they were back at Fort Derrick.

  The same team of scientists who had dissected the Russian soldiers from India were back to analyze the pictures, the bioswabs they’d taken, and the computer files they’d stolen.

  Again, the complete debriefing. And again they managed to assist enough to be present for some interesting conversations.

  Dr. Nelson tapped pictures of chromosomes on his computer. "Identical. This is where those monsters in India came from."

  "Poor sods, growing up underground, in cages. No wonder they were completely anti-social once they slipped their leases." Wolf turned away as if disinterested. "What about the animals they still had down there?"

  "Oh, they all had a lot of human genes implanted in them, or genes from other animals. According to the records they've got the gene sections so stable they've gone over a hundred generations with the smaller animals, without losing any of the engineered genes. I wish someone had thought to grab some live samples." He eyed the soldiers. Wolf tried to look repentant.

  And studied the stolen reports. What the Russian super soldiers could do was very interesting. Affect electronics and interface directly with computers. But apparently only at some subconscious level; the interface was measureable in both computer errors and abnormally fast responses. Correct responses. Or biased responses.

  Of course, they also had the strength and speed Wolfgang had seen in himself and his fellow telies. And good health, eyesight and hearing. Telepathy, telekinesis. All the reports were decades to several years old, the subjects ranged from children in the oldest reports to adults in the newest. No indication of any who would currently be younger than twenty-four.

  The politicians were irritated to find that apparently the Russians had indeed ended their human genetic experimentation.

  The team was released, and PFC John Dewulf spent what ought to have been leave assisting the cook. He had plenty of time to think. Subconscious direct control of computers? Or the biasing of computer calculations? What do they mean by that? Is that what my old colleagues are doing, up in Wisconsin, with the dimensional experiments? I swear, if I had leave I just might sneak in and ask them.

  Thorne snuck him cookies.

  Chapter Twelve

  NewGene Experimental Facilities

  Wisconsin, North American Union

  4 June 2114

  "The longer wires are good." Rebeccah shivered a little. I'm acting like I'm in charge, and Harry is working for me!

  Harry nodded as he worked on the old computers that controlled the prototype. "The wires weren't difficult. Getting permission to run the apparatus was just paperwork. And I managed to talk management into a set of capacitors to absorb the backlash of power you felt. Finding techs willing to do the work was the tough problem."

  Rebeccah nodded. She'd seen the patched in and untested, presumed, safety net. She doubted the techs were very reassured by it. Or the new insulating wall and ground wires between their controls and the magnetic containment room. The controls were still hardwired in through the walls, and the new insulation stopped below the big window into the vacuum chamber of the containment room. She was a little surprised that management had retrofitted the old prototype building at all.

  But then, they needed the techs, and couldn't afford too many government overseers watching, seeing how critical the telies were to the operation of the rings.

  The vacuum was holding at its minimum level, the techs were powering up the magnetic field.

  AK and Mercy had been watching the cooling down and spinning up of the small rings. They came back now and started sticking on their contacts. For this first test, Rebeccah wanted just the three of them.

  Without being tied down to the computer, Rebeccah, Mercy, and AK held hands and the power flowed smoothly around their little triangle. It seemed to make holding the magnetic bottle easier, and the rings tuned quickly. AK reached through and made contact. They held the small gate for almost two minutes. Mercy fainted. The sudden closing brought a rush of power that was mostly bled off into a set of capacitors; the mag bottle inflated and sped up. Rebeccah held it, supported it as it slowed gradually and stopped. She removed her awareness of it. Stretched, and eyed Harry.

  "We'll need more capacitors, especially when they rebuild the larger mag bottle." Rebeccah told him. "The three of us together worked really well. Can we try it tomorrow with some of the guys?"

  "Yes. I've got nine stations wired, here. Not that the little ring ever needed so many, but we can run a full up test of compatible Telie teams."

  Jason led the group, and Chauncey was not allowed to even observe. They started the current, the rings, but the rhythm wasn't there. Rebeccah studied them. As the fire flowed around the circle they were gradually getting out of sync.

  "There's one too many. Take Robert out."

  Harry glanced her way, then backed Robert out of the circle and then cut his computer link.

  The eight telies remaining shifted around and she watched, some lifted the fire, some lowered it, if they alternated . . . "Swap Kevin and Jack."

  And suddenly the fire was ripping around at high speed, the waves minimized.

  The rings sang and the world turned blue. Cold. Jason pushed the whirlpool down. Touched something. A dim view of a forested swamp, air blew in through the rings steamy and full of the odors of rot and flowers. The view closed down and the capacitors took the load. The mag bottle held steady.

  Rebeccah rubbed her freezing arms and relaxed.

  "That felt fantastic!" Jason whooped; he had more energy than she'd ever seen a team member with, after a session, even with the small rings.

  They all looked peppy.

  "I felt like I was drinking in the blue, and using that energy instead of running myself down."

  The others nodded. "There was energy all around us, once we got organized and the rings started singing."

  Harry nodded. "Right, then. We'll see about working up some regular teams. You eight worked well together. And AK, Mercy and Rebeccah."

  The tech had been shutting down the rings. Rebeccah had been peripherally aware of other people around, and now Dr. Mueller walked in, followed by Jack-the-Ass. "So, you think you've a grip on this, Harry? Mr. Kelso says you aren't very forthcoming."

  Harry shrugged. "I have a theory, which has worked twice in a row. If it holds up, we should be able to field eighteen teams, each capable of opening a dimensional gate. I know the Yellow group best, so I'll sort them first, then start working with the other groups. Perhaps Jack, Deiter, and Mary would like to observe? Then they can start thinking about how to best group their people."

  "If your theory works."

  "Of course."

  "And you'd better tell us everything." Jack eyed him angrily.

  "Of course." Harry brought out Rebeccah's lists. "Now, how many of these are yours? I suppose I should have split t
hem up by color, but that's getting so tedious."

  Jack ran down the short list.

  "About half. I don't see anyone from that worthless Orange Team of Deiter's."

  Harry returned to the schedule. "We can fit more groups in, in the afternoon. Let's get together with Deiter and Mary and sort out the best combinations."

  "He hasn't hardly got anyone with any ability."

  "No thanks to you." Deiter slammed the door behind himself and glared down at Jack. "I'm going to keep an eye on you from here on out. You can't just snap up other trainer's telies because you think they're pretty. That nasty little problem you had yesterday isn't going to happen again."

  Jack sneered. "You're soft on those women. We'd be better off using them as levers, rewards for the men's correct behavior."

  "You want whores, go hire some. The young women here are just as valuable to the company as the men are, and your salacious attentions are harmful to the experiments. And your throwing the girls to your ill mannered wolves? You're lucky there were no fatalities."

  Harry jumped in quickly. "We're going to sort out some new working teams, according to this theory, and test them on the prototype. Let's find Mary and get her in on this as well."

  The managers all left, altogether. Rebeccah stuck her head into the power room long enough to thank the techs for their help. Maybe it really isn't so hard to talk to people.

  Outside, a couple of Mercy's pets were escorting her off. AK, Jason, and Charlie were waiting for Rebeccah.

  AK was frowning at Charlie. "So Jack just moved the women in with the Red team?"

  Charlie was nodding. "He thought the women ought to be parceled out evenly, among the teams. Grabbed them as they left the cafeteria."

  Jason snorted. "Does he think building five is some sort of non-stop orgy? Boy, have I got news for him!"

  "Most of us stood up and defended the girls, but a couple of them made an end run around the main confrontation. Anyway, the girls stuck together, and remembered their lessons. Two of the guys are in the clinic, under observation. Then Deiter showed up, breathing fire, with an armed escort, and took the girls back to building two. I made sure the guards got in and out without a problem; they looked pretty nervy."

  "Good grief." AK sounded angry.

  Rebeccah shivered. It's getting worse. They're treating us more like slaves, every time I look. And Jack . . . She shivered, and tried to not think of doing something about him. Because she did not want to discover just how much damage she could do if truly pushed.

  By the time the full scale mag bottle equipment was replaced, and the building altered for greater safety, they had eighteen primary teams, and for the women, three additional trios who could support the primary teams, bringing in more power, even though they could not do the tasks on their own. Adding more people to the men's groups didn't work. Only with either four or eight telies could they open gates.

  The extra telies were organized into exploration teams, to actually step through to the other side and collect soil, rock and plant samples.

  Quickly.

  On the first trial of the new setup with the large rings, they could only hold the gate open for ninety-two seconds. Management wisely decided to work on extending that before sending people across.

  Harry had a nasty suspicion that management had realized that the telies were unprotected by labor laws, and had no families to miss them and bring in the police. He wondered how many of them they would lose, before jumping through the rings was found safe enough for real people to try.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Fort Bliss

  Texas, North American Union

  30 November 2114

  Sergeant Hays and Snake weren’t badly damaged; once they’d gotten the bleeding stopped it had just been a matter of toting them back to the secondary pickup point. And reporting in that they hadn’t been able to get close to the objective.

  Colonel Helms had been relieved that they'd gotten out at all. "We got updated satellite data, finally, right about the time you were hitting the ground. We realized they’d heavily reinforced the area." He sighed. "And that the drop zone overlapped one of the remote bivouacs they were setting up."

  Thorne nodded. "We just ran for it, nothing else to do, and hoped you’d have enough data to know we were heading for the secondary pickup. We appreciate the submersible being there. Really, really appreciate it."

  Helms nodded. "So, take some leave. Hays and Saunders will out of the hospital tomorrow, and both on medical leave until the doctors decide they’re goofing off."

  A full month of leave. Heaven. Wolfgang decided it had been too long since he'd been wine tasting in California, and headed straight there. He spent a week in Healdsburg, visiting all the local vineyards and talking to the vintners. Bought grape vines. He finally backtracked a bit and drove down the Russian River Road, to see if the merlot he remembered was really that fine.

  But age and civilization had beaten the old vintner.

  "Yep, going to build a dozen big houses up there. Just as well Charlie died before he saw it." The neighbor shook his head sadly. "Now they're trying to sell the building, to be moved, can you imagine that?"

  Wolfgang looked over at the beautiful redwood structure. It was propped up on beams, ready to move. He took note of the realtor, but put his foot down firmly on his imagination. He drove off . . . and failed to resist.

  "Six thousand, and I do all the moving and permitting. Take it or leave it."

  The realtor found the developer quite happy to have a signed contract and a cash chip on the spot. Wolfgang swooped the entire building up in a bubble. And added a miniature grove of young redwoods from the middle of the staked out roads.

  Probably not the smartest thing he'd ever done. The cash chip was too easily traceable if the government got involved in the disappearing building.

  But a building moved without the proper permits seemed far from the problems other countries were having with escaped genetically engineered people.

  The news was grim.

  Russia had admitted that they had had to call out a full division to put down their last hundred genetically engineered soldiers. They had, of course, claimed that those were also their only genetically engineered soldiers, and they'd had nothing to do with Kazakhstan nor the slaughter of the train full of refugees east of New Delhi. They claimed to have done no human genengineering for over two decades. Their own problem cleaned up, they were calling for the sterilization of all genetically engineered people, and the execution of all of those with specific artificial genes, the 'power' genes.

  The families of children with minor alterations, fixes of inherited damaging genes were outraged.

  Not outraged enough. There'll be lynchings yet.

  ***

  Harry chewed his fingernails and listened to Jack babbling at management.

  "It's an exercise in speed. One man leaps through, snatches whatever is in reach, and jumps back. We've practiced. It shouldn't take more than fifteen seconds."

  Emre One, all bright eyes and beaming grin, was ready to go.

  They'd tossed rabbits through, and they'd hopped off. The dog on the leash hadn't worked as well, fortunately the tech holding the leash had had sense enough to let go rather than be dragged through. The dog had wagged his tail and sniffed around, but obeyed the hand signal to come. He was still fine, a week later.

  Deiter Sloan, the trainer for the Orange team, and somehow genuinely liked by his kids, was chewing his fingernails whenever he was out of Emre's sight. Around Emre he was confident and calm.

  Harry resisted an urge to pace. The tech nodded that the rings were up to speed. Harry stuck his head in the power room. Got a thumbs up.

  "All right, team. Go ahead when ready." He tried to avoid blunt orders, or wording that made him a part of the team. And he certainly didn't call them girls. They told him what they didn't like, and had ways of subtly creating fiascos that looked like his fault if he repeated the error. AK, Mercy, an
d Rebeccah were still the best. They held hands in a triangle. Six other women, two other triangles, were assisting. The trios were all equal distances apart in a greater triangle—he'd heard them calling it a pyramid. The two extra trios helped them hold the gate longer.