by Ryder Stacy
Rona pushed closer against him, spellbound by his words. A meteor shot overhead, cutting the night with a sword of sparkling blue. Then another and another. Soon, the whole sky was filled with the zaps of starlight brilliance, hitting the atmosphere of the Earth from untold billions of miles out and burning up their lives in a final blaze of brilliant glory.
Rock continued after a moment. “Rona, once the United States had another great war—World War II they called it. And America and her allies conquered the whole world. But it didn’t subjugate its enemies. It helped them rise again and rebuild the ashes of their society into democracies. That is what we must do.”
“But we hate the Russians,” Rona said, confused.
“We must hate them for now.”
Fourteen
Killov inspected himself in the mirror and was pleased with what he saw. His cheekbones loomed ominously high on his face, little knobs of bone, above which two narrow eyes peered inscrutably out. The little party in Washington was over and he had won the round. Respect! He had gained respect from Zhabnov’s forces and all the gathered top brass of the occupying Russian forces. They had seen how much cleverer Killov was compared to that fool of a president. He had humiliated Zhabnov, no matter how adeptly the fat man had tried to recover. He had proven who was the more efficient, who had the best staff, who should really run things—from his eighty-story monolith in the center of the new America, Denver, not from some archaic remnant of the past, fading and crumbling into obscurity.
Washington—whorehouses and black servants everywhere waiting on all the bureaucratic big cheeses. The only blacks in the nation just about. They were carefully population-controlled while being treated with special rights such as extra food, clothing and travel. The Red masters of America didn’t want their servants to slit their throats one night while they were sleeping, after all. The Blackies, as they were called by their Russian owners, were even allowed travel outside their city. They set an example for the rebellious people of Africa and the yellows of Asia of the benevolence and anti-racism of the Russian forces in America. Bah, Washington was a stinkhole, Killov thought, strolling around his office, his thin hands clasped tightly behind his black, pigskin military jacket. It was a museum. The capital of America, should be—would be—here in Denver. The only thing that could control these rebels was force, not these petty propaganda ploys that the social scientists back in Moscow recommended. The social scientists didn’t understand: Everything is pleasure and pain. Pleasure is motivation, pain de-motivation. That’s what the Roman emperors understood. They had ruled in a Pax Romana for four hundred years, perhaps more. Then they allowed others—the barbarians—to immigrate, to share their wealth, their power. Finally, they were done in. To share is to lose, Killov thought. He wouldn’t share much longer with the fool of a president.
In the war room at the eastern side of his eightieth-floor office the supreme commander of the KGB forces watched as immense laser-lit situation screens lowered silently from the high ceiling. The room had been built by Killov to direct his forces now, and, when the time came for his struggle of ascendancy, to direct, if necessary, Killov’s growing strategic forces against Washington.
Killov sat dead-center in the most sophisticated technological room in the world except for the Satellite Control Complex in Moscow. That was the state-of-the-art. The absolute refinement of the technology that had defeated America one hundred years ago, kept constantly up to date. But Killov had been successful in having many of the Satellite Complex’s technological secrets stolen and copied for his war room. The red active light came on and the screen lit up with a map of the world, forty feet wide. In the dark of the room, little blue dots marked all known air activity, the ground positions of Russian forces, and the locations of all Russian warships and subs in the world. He had tapped into the satellite information being transmitted back to Central Control in Moscow. The premier, if he knew of this, would have Killov executed. But he didn’t know. And he wouldn’t until the time was right for Killov to make his move.
The KGB commander watched the dots of light shifting slowly about the flat globe of the Earth. So much power! So many weapons of incalculable destruction. He pressed several control buttons on the large, glowing instrument panel built into the arm of his chair. The map shrank until it was just the United States. Again, all Red forces were shown in their occupying positions across the country. He fed some information into the computer that operated the map: the coordinates of his latest guesswork, aided by information supplied by troop patrols on sightings of rebel forces, as to just where Century City was. He pressed keys on the board, wrote out the question, “Where is the most probable location of Century City?”
The computer whirred and buzzed and seemed to have trouble with the question. Then a blue dot appeared in the nearby mountains. Killov leaned forward. Could it be? Then another blue dot lit up, then another and another. He sat back in disgust. The whole Rocky Mountain range was filled with blue dots, flickering as the computer ran a blurring white arrow through the dots again and again and a mechanical voice spoke out from speakers at each side of the huge map, “Probable location of Century City is the following 15 locations. Probable location of Century City is the following 15 locations. Probable location of Century City is . . .”
Mikael Vassily was not a big man. He was old, and that did not bode well for his continued reign over the vast Soviet empire. But he was good at playing one group against another in the Politburo and presenting himself as the perfect compromise between all the warring factions.
He was seventy-one years old, a good age for this new world. His mind was as sharp and precise as ever. It was just his body that was slowly failing—the legs trembling as he walked, the dark spots showing up with increased regularity on his body, precursors of “cancerous conditions,” as his doctors politely put it. Still, not many men reached the age of seventy anymore. Not with all the poison in the air and the water and the ground.
He stood at a window in the Presidium building—the highest and newest structure in the crumbling, red-brick fortress walls of the ancient Kremlin. He could look down at Red Square from here and at the endless line of tourists from all over the empire, shivering in the two feet of snow as they waited hours to enter the hallowed halls of the Lenin Tomb. The tomb that contained both the body of the great founder of the Soviet Union and the body of that heinous criminal, Premier Drushkin, who had unleashed the hell of thermonuclear war upon the planet Earth one hundred years ago.
Premier Vassily was one of the very few in Russia, or in the world, who had seen the original, unexpurgated accounts of that wretched war. Those reports on video and in secret files told of the decision to send in the first strike and the resulting consequences as H-bombs went off all over the Earth. An event that had, of course, been built up ever since as a great triumph of the peoples of the Socialist sphere. The accounts he had read told how Russians had launched in a panic, fearing a U.S. strike—which was not in the offing—how their own paranoia had made them push the button. He’d seen what had been done to the world. Reconnaissance photos made by Russian planes showed a world that had been turned into a boiling hell. Nearly two-thirds of the Earth’s population destroyed. Vast regions of lands ripped apart as if by the claws of some monstrous demon from hell. And the Russians had not been spared nearly as much as the authorities pretended. Nearly twenty-five of the United States’ “big boys”—more than ten megatons—had struck major cities throughout the Soviet Union, killing at least thirty million in the first hour and double that amount over the next few months. And, by luck or accident, four of the American missiles had landed right in the center of the U.S.S.R.’s wheat-growing region, knocking out a good eighty percent of the land for eons. No, it had not been a good war—not at all.
He watched the snow fall—snow and ice in July, the Volga five feet thick, frozen solid. The world was topsy-turvy and getting more so all the time. And his own rule, that too was becoming more problem
atic all the time. The empire was in trouble. He had gone through the folders of reports on his desk, just before he took off his thick reading glasses and walked to the window. Now, as he stood watching the lines stretching off to the dimness of the distant snow, Vassily remembered nothing about those reports—soybean virus, crops failed, weather difficulties hampering troop movements, rising resistance in Indian subcontinent, the resurgence of Buddhism in Southeast Asia, with a distinctly anti-Red tinge.
Only one of those reports had raised his big, heavy eyebrows—Killov! Killov had, without permission, without even consulting President Zhabnov—not to mention Vassily himself—dropped two neutron bombs on some rebel outpost in the Rocky Mountains. Damn! There was so much radiation in the world already. The one thing he had asked his military commanders around the world was, please, no more atomic weapons. Let the world repair itself at least slightly. We need food to eat. We need to live on the damn planet. Didn’t they understand that?
But what was done was done. Vassily was, if nothing else, a pragmatist. The question was: What should he do now? Recall Killov? No, the man was too dangerous to have around. He had gathered a large faction of followers around himself in the Politburo. He was ambitious. Very ambitious. Have him executed? No, if he tried, Killov could well send assassins to do in Vassily, setting off a murderous power struggle within the state that could even lead to more war. Perhaps he could have his nephew, Zhabnov, move against Killov in some way to check him. No, Zhabnov had turned out to be a total disappointment to the premier. He had hoped that the president could balance the power of the growing KGB in America. But he was no match for Killov. Even his report about Killov’s use of the bombs was like some schoolboy screaming, “See what Killov did, Uncle, see!” Maybe he would have to replace Zhabnov with a much stronger personality. Yet if he did that, the new president of the United States might well conspire against him—even unite with Killov. Damn, he was getting tired of the game. The constant war of wills.
He buzzed his secretary. “Vanya, take a letter. Superconfidential, all that. To Commander Killov, titles, medals—fill it in like you always do. ‘Dear friend and comrade-in-arms, I read with interest a report that you have acted against the American resistance forces with a pair of small-yield neutron bombs. I know you did this in the spirit of my directive not to damage the environment, and I trust that the natural damage has been kept to a minimum. I, er, applaud your initiative and keen analysis of my attitude toward the use of nuclears. That policy is to restrain use unless the gravest of provocations has occurred. Please send details of provocation that led to the use of N-weapons.’
“Paragraph. ‘Your long-standing request to use N-weapons has been studied and approved in principle. However, any further judicious use of radiation-enhanced devices should be preceded by a statement from you as to the necessity for such measures. Ten,’ no make that, ‘eight, small-yield neutron bombs can be used at your discretion if you adhere to these guidelines. Hoping you and your comrades are well, I remain.’ Finish it up please.”
“Yes, sir,” Vanya said, closing her steno pad. “Do you wish it sent—”
“Right away. Let me read it again first. Thank you.” As the secretary left, Vassily rang a small white button at the underside of his desk. Less than a minute later the door opened quietly and a black servant, ebony face shining, dressed in a white waiter’s tuxedo, walked in with a slow, smooth gait carrying a tray with a crystal decanter and brandy glass in the center.
“Ah, Ruwando,” the premier said, looking up with pleasure in his wrinkled eyes. “My favorite time of the evening.” He smiled pleasantly.
“And mine as well, sir,” the African servant said in flawless Russian. He set the tray down on a small drink stand at the right of the premier’s desk and slowly, ritualistically removed the top from the decanter and carefully poured out exactly half a shimmering crystal goblet of golden, sweet brandy. The servant watched, a slight smile on his face, as Vassily lifted the drink to his mouth and took the first sip. His face lit up like a Cheshire cat’s. He licked his lips and eased back in the big, blue armchair that he rested in every evening.
“Ah, sir, so good to see you relax,” the black servant said soothingly. “Really, you must pay more attention to your health.”
“Indeed, indeed,” Vassily mumbled, taking another sip, already lost in his own reveries. The servant silently exited the room, closing the door without a sound. Vassily took a book down from the shelf, Notes from Underground, by Dostoyevsky, and began reading where he had left off:
It was still night and the snow was coming down in masses and falling almost perpendicularly, blanketing the pavement and the empty streets. There was no one in the street, no sound to be heard. The streetlamps gave a disconsolate and useless glimmer, I ran two hundred paces to the intersection and stopped short. Where had she gone? And why was I running after her? Why? To fall down before her, to sob with remorse.
But before long, the aging ruler of the world dozed off, his head falling back on the shadowed pillow. The snow outside grew more intense; little dunes were forming in Red Square. The radiation level warnings were going up in Murmansk, the Sikhs were rioting in India in 120-degree temperatures. In South China a war lord was preparing his thirteen thousand fanatical horsemen—fanatical Moslem followers of the Muabir, the flame of Allah.
In Rangoon, Buddhist monks burned themselves to protest the new religious limitations and the machine-gunning of one hundred of their number just the day before.
And in the Kremlin, in the breasted snow of Russia, the leader of the empire, the supreme premier of all the Russias, a tired old man, slept with his face pressed into the yellowing paper of Dostoyevsky, page 345.
Fifteen
Rona and Rock had to return to Century City by a fairly roundabout route, avoiding the high mountain passes and the waterfall trail which would be both too steep and too narrow for their heavily laden pack hybrids. The horses were tired, bone-tired after four days of carrying an inordinate amount of grizzly meat and pelts on their broad backs. Skinned and salted by Rock, and cut up into manageable chunks and put in the special airtight, plastic meat sacks that they carried, the grizzly meat would last days. They traveled in the mornings and the dark of the night to avoid the heat of the searing sun and the Red drones which were plentiful in the open country that they had to traverse due to the load. Each day they would set up camouflage netting under a thick grove of trees or a field of house-sized boulders spewed by an active volcano, and rest. Each day they made love. Rona had never felt happier in her life. Spending time with the man she loved, though she never said the words. She knew it would push him away like a frightened woods creature. The man was afraid of nothing on this Earth—no beast or soldier or KGB torturer. But he was afraid of women. Rock let himself enjoy her attentions. He knew there wasn’t much time for them. That he or she could be blown away in splatters of skin and blood, just like those grizzlies had. Death was near. Always standing behind one’s shoulder. Death had gravitated to Ted Rockson many times. Had come knocking on the door to take him away. And each time Rock had kicked it in the nuts and told it to fuck off, that he wasn’t ready to die. But even he knew that someday . . . someday. For in the game of death, the cards were stacked. Death won every hand.
At last they reached the southwest entrance to Century City, which was at a higher altitude though flatter terrain than the way they had departed. The hybrids huffed and wheezed with each step through the thin atmosphere. But soon, they were briskly walking down the final slope to the hidden city. Coming upon a grove of dark black spruce trees, Rock gave a sputtering larklike trill. He wasn’t as good as Detroit Green with these bird calls but he was getting better. The customary reply had been changed just last week, when it was feared that the captured Preston might betray the city’s location. So the lark got a reply from a starling, rather than an owl. A raucous squawk in three descending notes. A ten-by-ten-foot piece of what looked like solid turf suddenly opened up, r
ising on two metal poles at the end. Rock and Rona and their team of eight hybrids descended down a wooden ramp into an almost dark chamber. Rock knew that hidden eyes and hidden guns were trained on them at this very second, had been for miles. The entrance fell closed behind them and two guards ran over and knocked it perfectly into place, so that from above not a seam of human touch could be seen. The echoing hoofbeats of the skittish pack animals were the only sounds for a few seconds. Then greetings of, “Rock. Rock. Glad you’re back” came from all sides. Still the lights didn’t brighten. Torch-lit figures approached from the darkness. In the front ranks, his face garishly lit by the orange flames of his hand-held torch, was intelligence chief Rath.
Rockson took his side arm out, thinking trouble. “What’s the matter?” he asked, dismounting.
“A power outage, Rock. It’s been going on for nearly twenty hours and looks like it could go on for days. We’ve got no lights, no power at all, other than the emergency generators which are just keeping life-support systems in the hospital and our defensive electronic apparatus functioning. I’m really worried about the hydroponics. They say another twenty-four hours without any juice and it’s all over for everything in there.”
“What the hell happened?” Rock asked, putting his .12-gauge pistol smoothly back into its bed of dark leather. “A diode generator blew?”
“Nothing like that, Rock. It’s crazy. It—it was the Reds, although they don’t know they caused the trouble. One of their big Stalagva airlifters lost an engine—the damned thing fell right off and the ramjet nose-dived into our main solar collector on Ice Mountain. The place is a mess up there. All our solar units, our circuitry, step-up transformers, everything—gone. We’ve sent up three teams already to begin replacing destroyed parts and making whatever emergency repairs are possible. But it’s hard going. It’s storming up there tonight. We set up a fogger to shield all the activity from the damned drones they sent out to look for the airlifter. It must have gone down a few miles down the road. Their stupid inefficiency has dealt us a blow this time. If they find that camouflaged power installation they’ll follow the buried cables to Century City itself. So while two teams are installing new solar panels—disguised, like the old ones, as ice formations—the two other teams are cutting up the wreckage and dumping it down crevasses. If the Reds don’t see any pieces up there they won’t even come down to investigate.”