"I don't like this," said Lawson, riding with Cleet and the President in the armoured car at the centre of the convoy. Route 70 had been cleared of vehicles and roughly repaired, almost certainly by the gangs that controlled south Pittsburgh. The convoy should be seeing people on foot, horses and carts, and maybe a diesel truck converted to vegetable oils, but there was nothing.
"It's the sound of the convoy," said Cleet. "It carries a long way in open country like this. The people here would associate vehicles with foraging by the gangs."
Lawson wasn't convinced. The Presidential convoy had half the vehicles and slightly less than two-thirds of the people it started with. An advance guard under Colonel Hinkley was around five kilometres ahead. It carried most of the heavy armaments, while a smaller rear guard was the same distance behind them.
The armoured car came to a faultline across the road and slowed. The sharp division in the landscape ran at forty-five degrees to the convoy's line of travel. Stones and rubble had been used to fill in a drop of over a metre between the two sides, and it looked serviceable enough.
As the car grumbled slowly down the rough surface Cleet could see cart ruts and bare footprints in the dusty surface. It was the new face of humanity.
A long straight followed, and a gravel track led off to the right. It was wide enough for a horse and cart to pass similar traffic coming the other way, and it looked well used.
"That looks new," said Cleet, and he wondered for a moment why someone would go to so much trouble with shovels and wheelbarrows when they could repair the existing road network more easily. That thought would come back to haunt him.
"Vanguard coming under heavy fire!" crackled the comms link. "It's a set up. Big pile of logs and dirt across the road. We came round a bend and saw the barrier, and tried to reverse out, but it was too late. They're behind us now as well. We'll stay with the vehicles and try to shoot it out."
Colonel Hinkley came on the line.
"Only small arms at this stage," he said, "but we're outnumbered. This is well organised, it has to be a trap set by the gangs. I think we can expect heavier arms and reinforcements to arrive shortly.
"If you can attack the forces behind us, we might be able to break free, but you'll have to be fast. I would recommend an escape pod, just in case."
There was a long silence in the armoured car.
"Understood," said Lawson. "Over and out."
"No," said the President, shaking his head. "I won't let these men and women lay down their lives in an action like this unless I stand alongside them."
"Nice words, Mr President," said Lawson, "but you're a lousy shot, and I'd feel a lot safer if you didn't have a gun."
The President looked stunned for a moment, and then his face creased into a smile.
"You have a point there, John," he said. Cleet had never heard him use Lawson's Christian name. Then he understood what was going on. An escape pod was a small, fast-moving group to get the President to safety while the insurgents were tied up fighting the convoy.
A short time later a side road came up on Route 70, and an SUV with a much larger fuel tank than usual left the convoy with six people inside it. The SUV was only lightly armoured, but it had a high road clearance and 4WD capability.
Cleet had been given a rendezvous point on the other side of Washington. They were to wait for three days, and make a run for Fort Wayne if the rest of the convoy didn't turn up.
The President watched the rest of the convoy pick up speed as they went to the aid of the trapped vanguard. Lawson had made the decision to stay with the main group and coordinate the rescue attempt. The tactical officer in the SUV was now Major Greer. There were two marines and an intelligence field operative making up the SUV complement.
It was soon evident the side road was being used by the locals, but the larger trees and vehicles on it hadn't been moved. Nor had the worst of the earthquake damage had much attention. Detours were in place around the worst of it, muddy tracks that cut through surrounding paddocks.
From time to time the sound of gunfire reached them. It seemed to be taking a long time for the main part of the convoy to rescue the vanguard. Cleet remembered the newly built gravel road that had veered off to the right. It was the detour they should have taken. Route 70 itself had been set up as a trap – for travellers from both directions.
The first rifle shots bounced off the SUV toward the end of the day. Word of the convoy would have spread, and there would be a bounty on their heads now. Greer made an effort to get the SUV ahead of their pursuers, and seemed to have succeeded, but they were fired on again at the start of the second day.
Inti, the field operative, slipped out of the SUV on several occasions when there was sufficient cover, and disappeared behind them. They waited for him half an hour down the trail, and three times he re-appeared. He started carving notches on his short-barrelled bush rifle. On the fourth occasion he didn't come back.
They lost the SUV at the start of the third day. Washington was close now, fifteen thousand people and head of Washington county before the earthquakes. The side roads had taken them south of the place, rather than north of it as intended.
It was late morning, and Cleet noticed how the wire had been taken off the fences along the road. It turned the valley into a large open parkland, where something was browsing the grass. Moments later a herd of cattle came out of a lane ahead of them and blocked the road.
Several figures on horseback appeared, urging the cattle forward. The cattle spread across the valley, and the drovers started moving them toward the SUV. More cattle came down the lane. The herd seemed endless.
"Too many horsemen," said Major Greer. "I don't like it. This is a well-organised group, and I can see rifles on their saddles."
The marine who was driving turned the SUV around, but the men on horseback had seen them now, and were coming up fast. The SUV headed back along the road, but two more riders appeared on their right. Cleet had no idea where they'd come from.
A tree lay across the road, and the SUV slithered into the paddock beside it. The marine saw a second tree blocking their way further on, and kept to the paddock rather than regaining the road. The ground became muddier, and then they were cutting giant furrows through the grass. The marine tried to turn out of it, and the SUV spun. When he tried to get them moving again the tyre wells filled with mud.
"Out! Out now!" bellowed Greer, and the two marines took up positions facing the oncoming men. The cowhands veered off when the marines fired over their heads, but only to find cover. Then bullets began to ping off the SUV in earnest.
Greer grabbed a rifle from the boot and hustled the President across the paddock toward a wooded hill, with Cleet in support. The marines took cover behind the SUV, and for a while it looked like they would hold the attackers off. Then more of the drovers arrived, and began to work their way around the car at a distance.
The marines finally broke cover, and began to run after Greer. One fell face down in the grass, and then bullets began to cut into the grassland around the figures climbing the slope toward the trees. The President pitched down onto one knee, and Cleet lifted him up and half carried him. Greer emptied his handgun toward the attackers as the President hobbled into the trees. The final marine spun around, grazed by a bullet as he reached the bottom of the slope, but he picked himself up and made it to shelter.
The small party struggled to the crest of the hill, and stopped for a breath. They listened. It didn't sound like they were being followed.
Two days later they had managed to bypass Washington on foot, but they were still a long way from where they would meet the convoy. The bullet had passed cleanly through the President's calf muscle, but he was weak from swinging along on improvised crutches. The Marine had broken ribs, but the bullet hadn't penetrated the rib wall. He was keeping up, but he was developing a fever.
They had found tins of food in an abandoned house, enough to keep them going for a few days. That was one problem
overcome, but they didn't know if the convoy had broken free of the blockade or not. Would they would find help waiting when they got to the rendezvous point?
55
Imazighen village
Atlas Mountains, North-west Africa
Jo passed Don on her way to the front of the room, and placed her hand on his shoulder briefly. Mosha looked at Bull and grinned. The whole village had breathed a sigh of relief when the relationship between Don and Jo had finally got past the awkward stage.
With the discovery of I Wadu in the buried ship, the miniscule odds of the human race beating the citadels had actually increased a little. The strange creature had an understanding of the ship that was allowing Jo's team to progress in leaps and bounds. Today, Jo was going to report back on what they had learned.
It seemed a long time since the message from Cal at Fezzou. That message had said only two of the citadels were inhabited by the invading Aeskri, and Don's team would be part of the force going up against the one in Cambodia.
"I hope you've all got your brains switched on!" said Jo, and the room grew quiet. It was packed full, as it usually was for meetings like this. She paused to savour the moment. Each day had been so full of setbacks and triumphant surges forward that she hardly knew how they'd made each discovery. Surely it had been more than a week?
"The alien 'slave force' is nanobots," she said, "as we suspected. These are usually built to be harmless to living things – no sentient creature wants its workforce gnawing its legs off – but the bots could be redirected to a military role. I Wadu has found files and schematics for the nanobots and I'm pleased to say it's an area we have quickly mastered.
"The worst scenario for us would be the Aeskri over-riding the failsafe protocols that protect living things, and giving a command to the nanobots to harvest calcium. That's bones to you and me. In that case we'd be reduced to squirming slabs of meat as soon as we entered the dead zones.
"We've got an answer to the problem, and the teams going in will be protected by a localised field that will effectively over-ride the Aeskri commands. The nanobots will stand around motionless until we pass by, and then get back to whatever they were doing. However, the other things we're working on are still at the early stage, with no final answers."
She paused to go through her notes, and Don walked up to stand beside her.
"I know this seems a rather piecemeal approach," he said, "but all we can do is try to think like the Aeskri, and then counter the ways they might use their technology against us. It's a 'one scenario at a time' approach.
"On a more military note I Wadu has shown us enough of their capabilities to conclude they're strong up close and at a distance, but they don't really think in terms of medium range.
"Historically that's been a human strength. They won't expect us to be so effective at distances from pistol shot to sniper fire. Speaking of which, the Rohifs have a shipment of bullets for us made from alien alloys, and small numbers of a new type of rifle that can take the new bullets.
"We now have a much better understanding of the Aeskri themselves," said Jo, taking over. "I'm sure we've all wondered this, and yes, they can breathe our air, but only for a short period of time.
"Nitrogen will always be the most available inert gas on a rocky planet, and the balance between plants and animals will generally settle close to the 21% of oxygen that's in our atmosphere. The difference is that their planet is exposed to greater stresses.
"It has a larger sun, stronger solar winds, and greater tidal effects. There are compound gases in their atmosphere that would be poisonous to us, but they're gases the Aeskri have adapted to use. They store them and use them as a faster fuel for muscle burn than oxygen, so they can put out more energy for a short period of time.
"Our best guess is that with the right combination of drugs in their systems, the Aeskri could breath our atmosphere for a few days. I Wadu grew up in our atmosphere and seems to have adapted to it. Maybe his 'parents' did a bit of bio-engineering on him."
"Enough science!" bellowed Graham from the back of the room. "How do we kill the bastards?"
There were a few chuckles at that. Near death experiences can change someone's personality. Graham had lost a lot of his Cambridge professor approach, and started living much more in the moment.
"We'll have to figure that out when we get there," said Don, taking the question seriously. "That's why it's important we stay alive long enough to learn what their weaknesses are. The final solution may be a technological one. We're hoping to get Jo's team patched into their systems at the citadel, fighting for us from the inside. Unfortunately we've no idea how to do that yet."
There was silence while his audience digested this. It was becoming clear the strike force at the citadel would be going in against a host of unknowns.
One thing Don hadn't told them was a strange request he had made of Cal. Was it possible to drop into a Dayak settlement in the middle of Kalimantan – the old Borneo – and pick up a Dayak team?
Don had often visited a forest ranger friend in Kalimantan while on R&R from Afghanistan. His friend had married into a Dayak tribe, and was helping the tribe make good use their land. Later Don had led a team into the area to stop diamond smuggling from South Kalimantan, money that was funding European crime syndicates.
He wondered if the Dayak team that had helped him then would be interested in this mission. He had insisted his message be repeated exactly. 'Spirit man b'ness. We killem longfella big.' He laughed to himself at that.
The earthquakes would have had little effect on the Dayak way of life, apart from initial casualties. He figured they would want a chance to get back at the agency that had killed their people.
"The citadels have been building something new," he said, getting the attention of the room again. "Reports are coming in of new buildings in places where the citadels are most numerous. We have five cases where a number of citadels are feeding materials into a central location.
"At this stage we're only guessing what the buildings are for. Assuming the Aeskri have finished their 'pacification' program for humanity, and seeing their new harvesting program on the surface, we think these sites may be space ports. The Aeskri may need biomass to go with fusion engines to make rockets."
That brought a murmur of comment.
"We don't know what the long-term goal of the Aeskri is," continued Don, "but it may be a lot bigger than we think. They're not far enough ahead of us in technological terms to build a fanciful 'stargate', but they could make Earth more like their own planet. They could initiate nuclear fusion in Jupiter's core, and turn the Solar System into a binary sun system.
"The space ports may be the first stage in something like that. We don't know what they're up to, but it reinforces the fact we need to strike back while our planet is still the one we remember!"
This time there was a much longer silence.
"Any more business?" said Don.
"You talk about us taking on the Cambodian citadel," said Mosha, "so who's going to have a crack at the one in Peru?"
"Still nothing definite on that," said Don. He was surprised that Mosha had asked. He shared every bit of intel with his most experienced team member, but the SAS man would have his reasons.
Mosha was good at 'ears around the camp', and Don figured a few people had been asking this question. Sometimes people needed reassurance, an understanding that senior staff didn't have any more information than they did.
"The US President is on his way from Mt Weather to the new alliance of states capital at St Louis," said Don. "Once he arrives at St Louis we might get a clearer idea of what the US can do in Peru. The President is the only one who can commit what's left of their military to an action."
"If he arrives in St Louis," said Mosha, shaking his head. It was a long way through chaotic territory. Don nodded his agreement.
56
Somewhere west of Pittsburgh
Pennsylvania, USA
Toward evenin
g of the fifth day, the remaining members of the Presidential escape pod heard a mournful sound on the breeze. The long howl of hunting dogs was coming from the country they had just travelled through.
"It took them a while to get onto our trail," said Cleet. "I thought we'd got away with it."
"I was counting on a bounty being offered for our capture," said Major Greer. "That meant people would be looking for us. Dogs complicate matters though."
"What's our best course of action?" said the President. His voice was weak, and there was little prospect of the group increasing their pace without carrying him. The last marine had also become more feverish.
"Travelling over water, Mr President," said Greer, "just like you see in the movies. Find a river and build a raft maybe. The river will probably take us away from our rendezvous point, but it would stop us being found by dogs."
Cleet rummaged in his pockets for his most detailed map of the area. He and Greer studied it together.
"Our best shot is the Ohio river," said Cleet after a while, "but that's several days walk away and we don't have that much time. We could maybe get to Buffalo creek at Taylorstown."
They looked at each other. The amount of water in Buffalo creek right now was an unknown, and there would be trees across the creek in places, and logjams. But it was the only plan they had.
The four men pushed on as hard as they could until it was almost dark, and made camp without a fire. The President was exhausted, and light showers added to everyone's misery. An hour later they had managed to put up a reasonable shelter, and find some passable bedding. They could only hope the posse would also stop for the night.
The next day was fine. After a breakfast of cold beans and peaches, they set out before dawn. It was mid-morning when they heard the first howl from the dogs.
"They've found our overnight camp site," said Greer. "That puts them two to three hours behind us, probably less since they're travelling faster than us. We've been sticking to wooded areas so their horses will have to be led. That will slow them down, but I think they'll catch us before nightfall."
Struggle for a Small Blue Planet Page 24