by Rob Boffard
And then you’ll have to choose between them a second time, says the small voice in my mind.
I ignore it. That can come later. I try to picture the forest again, imagining running in the sunlight, in a place where there’s air and water and food. Where I can see the sky.
“So, my friends were on another escape pod,” I say, trying to keep the excitement out of my voice. “I need to find them.”
“Yeah?” says Harlan. “Where were you folks headed?”
The name jumps up out of nowhere. “Alaska.”
His brow furrows. “Alaska?” He comes back, bends over the map, so close that his nose almost touches the paper. “The border’s over a hundred miles away. Well, what used to be the border. Plus, state itself goes all the way across to the Bering Sea. Nothing but ice out there.”
A sick feeling starts to swell in my stomach, as if the meat is turning toxic. I didn’t have time to think about the physics of our re-entry before, but I’m doing it now and it’s chasing away the good feeling I had before. At the speed we were travelling, two pods launched thirty seconds apart could come down hundreds of miles from each other.
Not good. Not good at all.
Harlan clears his throat. “Where were you supposed to end up? In Alaska?”
My mind goes blank. My finger hovers above the map, as if a name will leap out at me, but all the letters run into each other. There’s got to be a way. I have to find them.
Then I remember. “Anchorage,” I say. “We were going to some settlement in Anchorage.” I scan the map for it, and let out a cry when I find it, nestled into a small bay. “If they launched when they were supposed to—”
“Kid,” Harlan says quietly.
“—then they would have landed nearby. And there are other people there, so—”
“Kid.”
I look up at Harlan, and the sick feeling in my stomach expands, spreading through my body.
“What?” I say.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “Your friends are already dead.”
23
Prakesh
“We’re here,” says Ray.
Prakesh jerks awake. He hadn’t even realised he’d dropped off. His neck immediately starts complaining–the vehicle’s seats weren’t designed for sleeping, and he’d passed out with his head at an awkward angle. His mind feels like it’s floating three feet above him.
Iluk kills the engine, then bangs the door open and slides out. For the first time Prakesh realises that they can barely see out of the windows–they’re grimed over, caked with dirt. Only a thin strip at the top of each one is still clear, and Prakesh can see the early light of dawn peeking through the windows on his left.
Ray opens the door. Prakesh has to shield his eyes against the glare.
“Come out when you’re ready,” says Ray. He and Nessa clamber through the door, with Okwembu following them. Nessa half closes it and Prakesh can feel the chill air licking at his exposed skin.
Carver rolls his head from side to side, massaging his shoulders. He looks exhausted, like he’s aged ten years in a single night. Clay, too, is slowly blinking awake.
“Glad you got some sleep,” Carver says, as Prakesh rubs his neck.
“You didn’t?” He runs his tongue along the inside of his cheeks, trying to scare up some saliva. It doesn’t work.
“Five minutes, maybe. We’ve been driving for hours.”
“Right,” Prakesh says. He’s trying to get his thoughts in order, but it’s like tying shoelaces with thick gloves on. There’s something about these people–Ray and Nessa and the silent Iluk–that he doesn’t like.
Carver gestures to the door. “You getting out, P-Man? Or we just going to sit here all day?”
Prakesh pauses for a moment, then pushes open the door and steps outside.
The first thing he notices is that the ground is soft–much softer than the tough, packed dirt of the forest. The second thing is the air. It smells different–a mix of a thousand scents, of salt and chemicals and decay and something else, something metallic and alien.
He looks up, and his mouth falls open.
Prakesh has seen pictures of the ocean before. They always showed blue sky, sandy beaches, white-capped waves. He didn’t expect oceans like that to exist on Earth any more, but this…
It’s a black, seething mass of water, hissing at the shore like an angry monster. There are waves, but they’re stubborn little things, barely managing a fringe of froth before sinking into the edge of the water.
And there’s a city in the ocean.
Or at least, what used to be a city. The buildings are half submerged, poking out of the water, tall towers reaching to the sky. In the pale dawn light, Prakesh can see that most of the towers are half destroyed, their walls and floors broken away, exposing their dark interiors to the low-hanging clouds. There are dozens of them, spread out along the shore, which curves away on either side of them.
The closest tower is barely fifty feet away–Prakesh can still see the main revolving door, water lapping at its frame, the glass long gone. The interior is dark, with gaps in the far wall that let in a little daylight. Most of the upper half of the tower is gone, the steel beams exposed like old bones.
Carver lets out a low whistle from behind him.
“Something, right?” says Ray. He has the vehicle’s hood open, and is rooting around inside. With a yank, he pulls an object from deep in the engine.
“Spark plug,” he says, when he sees them looking. “Make sure this old girl doesn’t go anywhere.” He raps a headlight with one hand. Prakesh sees that they’re parked a little way off a paved road, pockmarked with potholes, vegetation pushing up through the cracks.
“What happened here?” says Prakesh. Clay is climbing out of the Humvee now, and is looking around, his eyes huge. Okwembu is standing a little way off, looking out over the water, motionless. Her blanket is loose around her shoulders, the wind playing with its hem.
Ray slams the hood closed, pocketing the spark plug. “Anchorage?” he says. “Sea claimed her, just like every other city on the west coast. East, too, for all we know. Happened long before the Engine brought us here.”
There’s a noise from further down the beach. Iluk and Nessa appear, dragging another vehicle behind them–a boat, the same size as the first vehicle but flat-bottomed, with a bulging motor on the back.
They drop it near the edge of the water with a thud. That’s when Prakesh sees that Nessa has a gun: a lethal-looking rifle with a cylindrical scope mounted on top. Its lenses pick up the thin dawn light.
Ray reaches inside the wheeled vehicle, pulling out an empty canister and an opaque, flexible tube. He flips open a small flap on the side and winds the tube down into it. He puts his mouth around the tube and sucks in his cheeks. A second later, he turns and spits a thick stream of fuel onto the dirt, then wipes his mouth. The rest of the fuel is coming up the tube, draining into the canister.
“Where’d you get this, anyway?” Carver says, gesturing to the vehicle. For the first time, there’s a glimmer of excitement in his eyes.
“The Hummer?” says Ray. “Had her for years, long before we even knew about the Engine. It was Prophet’s originally. While back, some other Nomads tried to jump him, but he took ’em down and took what they had. She’s still in pretty good shape, right?”
“Nomads?” says Clay.
Carver ignores him. “What’s it–she–run on?”
“Diesel,” Ray says. “Gotta look after it. Not too much around these days.” He looks at Prakesh. “We were kind of hoping that you’d have some with you. Some sort of fuel anyway.”
Prakesh feels a tiny drumbeat of fear in his chest, fear of something he can’t quite place. Once they’re in the boat, out on the water, there’s nowhere to run to. He can’t get over the thought, and he doesn’t know why it scares him so much.
Carver hasn’t noticed. “I built one, you know. Well, not one as big as this, and it didn’t have the roof or anything
—” he points to the top of the Hummer “—but it was fast.”
Ray smiles and reaches inside the Humvee, emerging with a rifle of his own.
“We get animals down here sometimes,” Ray says, seeing that Prakesh has noted the gun. “Wolves, mainly. Nessa swears she saw a bear one time, not that I believe her. And then there are the Nomads, of course.”
He gestures to the boat. Clay is already perched on the side, and Okwembu is clambering on board. “Hop in. Iluk’ll push her into the water.”
“Yeah, sure,” Prakesh says. He turns to Carver, who is still admiring the Humvee. “Talk to you for a sec?”
Carver looks up, but before he can say anything Ray steps between them. “Something on your mind?” he says. It’s Prakesh’s imagination–it has to be–but his accent has grown thicker.
“Just want to talk, that’s all,” he says. “The second escape pod might have come down near here. We should look for that one, too.” He tries to sound natural, but struggles to keep the nervousness out of his voice.
“We just saw the one,” says Ray. “Besides, we should get you fed. Cleaned up. Right?”
Prakesh tries a smile, flashes Carver a meaningful glance. “Can’t leave our friend out there.”
Carver stares back at him, confused and wary. Ray spits. The saliva arcs through the air, burying itself in the sand, and Prakesh smells a hint of fuel in the air. The drum in his chest is beating harder now.
Ray gestures to the ocean with the rifle. “We’ll talk on the way.”
So much for subtlety, Prakesh thinks. “What’s the Engine?” he says. “Who’s Prophet?”
“Get in the boat.”
“Where are you taking us? What’s out there?”
All the good humour has left Ray’s face, and what remains is hard and cold. “Food. Shelter. A society. Just like the radio message said.”
“I’ve been thinking,” Prakesh says, deciding to plunge ahead. “That message? So you’re just broadcasting your location to anyone who can listen? I don’t buy it. I’m not going anywhere until you tell us—”
Ray raises his rifle, and points it at Prakesh’s face. Nessa and Iluk do the same, tracking Carver and Clay. Okwembu watches, not reacting.
Ray’s smile is thin and humourless. “Get in the damn boat.”
24
Riley
The silence in the cave stretches on forever. The edge of the map has curled over my hand again, but I barely notice it.
Your friends are already dead.
“You don’t know that,” I say.
Harlan’s face is grave. He doesn’t say anything. And, right then, the anger comes back. How dare he? He doesn’t know Prakesh. He doesn’t know Carver. Wherever they are, whatever they’re dealing with, they’ll be OK. They have to be.
My fist is clenched, scrunching up part of the map. Slowly, I let go, pulling my hand back. Then I take a deep breath, the anger subsiding. For now.
“What’s in Anchorage?” I say. The heat in the cave has built up, drying out my tongue and blocking my sinuses.
Harlan bends down to his backpack, the cave echoing with clunks and thumps as he rummages through it. He pulls out an ancient radio, one with an antenna and a big chunky knob.
There’s a crank on the side, and Harlan gives it a few quick turns. A light on the radio flickers on, growing orange, and we hear the thin sound of static. Harlan mutters to himself, adjusting the knob on the front of the radio, and then there’s the voice, the message, the one I heard for the first time on the bridge of the Shinso Maru.
This time, the message chills me to the bone.
“—can hear us, we are broadcasting from a secure location in what used to be Anchorage, Alaska. There are at least a hundred of us here, and we have managed to establish a colony. We have food, water and shelter. The climate is cold, but survivable. If you can hear us, then know that you’re not the only ones—”
“They do a new one every couple of months,” Harlan says, shutting the radio off. “But it’s been ever since we got up here. I don’t know how they get the power to do it, but it doesn’t matter.”
“Who’s they?”
“We don’t know.” Harlan adjusts his position. “Back when I was in Whitehorse, we had a survivor come through. Russian guy. Least, I think he was Russian. Had an accent you had to really listen hard to understand. Massive beard, too, like fur on a—”
“Harlan.”
“Sorry. Don’t ask me how he managed to get to here from Alaska, but he did it.”
I don’t know where Whitehorse is, and I have only the vaguest idea of where to find Russia. “What happened to him?” I say.
“Told us he was in a big party out of Siberia,” Harlan says. “Winters had got too heavy there, so they were coming east, hoping for something better. They heard the message as they were crossing through Alaska, and decided to check it out.
“They got ambushed, even before they got to the source of the signal. Guy couldn’t stop shaking when he told us. Said it was like the night just folded in on ’em. Men, women, children, didn’t matter. Anchorage swallowed ’em whole. He managed to get away, along with his wife. She died on the way here.”
“And you believed him?”
Harlan shrugs. “Not like we were gonna go there ourselves to find out.”
“There has to be an explanation,” I say, staring at the map. “Maybe something else took them. Maybe the settlement was—”
“You don’t get it, do you?” says Harlan. “Don’t you think it’s a little strange that they’re just broadcasting their location?” He waves his hands in the air, waggling his fingers. “Hey! Everybody! We got food and supplies! All you can eat! Form an orderly line!”
I stare down at the map, not wanting to think about his words.
“If they were really accepting survivors,” Harlan says, “then the Nomads would have cleared ’em out long ago. Them, and anybody else who feels like livin’ off what other people got. You want to know what I think? I think whoever sent this message is doing the same thing. Why go out hunting for supplies when you can just have them come straight to you?”
He puts a hand on my shoulder–then jumps when I slap it away. The anger I feel is immediately replaced by embarrassment, and I turn away, hugging myself tight. This isn’t his fault.
But, right now, I feel like I did when I looked up at the sky–like the world has gone fuzzy at the edges.
“You ain’t gettin’ to Anchorage anyhow,” he says, not unkindly. “You’re four hundred miles crow flight, and you won’t make it even halfway before the snows set in.”
I’m barely listening. I’m back on my feet, pacing, thinking hard. Four hundred miles. It’s a long way, but if I leave now I can get there in a month or two. It’s nowhere near fast enough, but it’ll have to do.
“The person I loved was on that ship,” I say, each word carried on a hot, angry breath. “I have to find him.” In that moment, I don’t know if I’m talking about Carver or Prakesh.
Harlan doesn’t touch me again. He just steps around until he’s in front of me, leaning slightly away, as if he’s afraid I’m going to lunge forward and bite him.
“I don’t think you understand what you’re about to do. How’re you planning to feed yourself? Or navigate? That’s without talking about the weather.”
“I can deal with the cold.”
“Can you deal with a snap that drops the temperature twenty degrees in ten minutes? I’ve seen that stream you were at frozen solid. And we got wind storms that come out of nowhere. They’ll knock you right off your feet. ’Sides, you’ve already met the wolves.”
He stops to take a breath. When he speaks again, his voice is quieter. “What’s the biggest space you ever been in?” Harlan says quietly.
“What do you mean?”
“When we were on the way over here, I caught you looking up at the sky. Like a goddamn deer in a spotlight.”
“I’ve been outside the station before,” I say,
crossing my arms. “I’ve been in space.”
“Right. Right. But for how long? And I’m guessing you had a space suit.”
In the silence that follows, I realise that I don’t have a single thing to say.
“Your mind ain’t right,” Harlan says, locking his eyes onto mine. “You’re snapping at every little thing, and you just ain’t ready for what’s out there.”
I look away, refusing to give up, desperately trying to think about how I could do this. Four hundred miles. I’ll need gear, food, a map. Maybe Harlan can help me. Maybe I can—
When I look back, I see that he’s staring at my thigh.
“What’s that?” he says, stepping in close.
“Nothing,” I say, my mind still on Anchorage. “Just a cut.”
“Lemme see.” He goes down on one knee, reaching in. I shy away, startled, but stop when I see the look on his face. The worry on it.
“I told you, I’m fine,” I say, baring my teeth as his fingers gently explore the cut, peeling back the fabric of my pants. “It’s a flesh wound. I got hit by a piece of shrapnel, but I took it out.”
He stops for a moment, grabbing a nearby lantern and bringing it closer. The heat from the glass bakes onto my skin.
“Deeper’n that,” he says. “And there’s still some metal in there.”
“What?”
“Yeah, there, and there, and… yeah, hi, I see you. You didn’t get it all out. This from the…” He lowers his hand to the floor fast, making an explosion sound with his mouth when it hits, looking up at me questioningly.
I nod, furious at myself for having missed this. The smaller shards must have broken off the bigger one when it embedded itself in my flesh.
“So we take the rest out,” I say. My gut churns–more pain. I tell myself I can handle it, that it’ll be worth it if it gets me moving again. It can’t possibly be worse than the pain I felt when I cut that bomb out of me.
But Harlan is shaking his head, sitting back on his haunches. “Can’t do it,” he says. “Nope. Nuh-uh. Can’t. They’re too deep. Do you have any idea how much it’s gonna hurt when those things come out? Do you?”