“I don’t give a flying fuck,” she drawled.
Russell faltered. The survival of everyone on New California was at stake! All men, women and children! And she didn’t care?
“Marlene, I——”
“Piss off!” She slammed the door in his face.
For several seconds, Russell stood staring at the door, open-mouthed, before shaking his head and turning around. Then we’ll do it without her!
Russell ran to the workshop. He opened the big double door, raced to the first jeep and turned on the engine. He left the jeep standing with the engine running, and ran back inside to get the second one. Every second counted.
Dr. Cashmore was the first to show up. He was wearing a thick parka and still looked very tired. He had his weapon slung over his shoulder. “Doesn’t sound good, Russell.”
The chemist wasn’t exactly renowned for his fighting skills, but Russell was determined to set off as soon as he had a group of eight together. “Sure doesn’t. Jump in the other jeep. You’re driving.”
Awkwardly, Cashmore climbed into the driver’s seat and threw his weapon carelessly onto the back seat. Russell shook his head but said nothing.
Bill Lennox, Max Lindwall, Ann Penwill, Manuel Sargent, Jenny Baldwin, Stephen Grass, Michele Choo, and Sammy Yang and his wife Katrina turned up in quick succession. Trying to hide his shock, Russell took the weapons that Sammy handed him. This wasn’t exactly an experienced troop of battle-hardened soldiers. The only one of them who’d been a soldier when they arrived on New California was Ann. The others, apart from fighting against the monsters a few weeks ago, had no experience whatsoever. They didn’t stand a chance in hell against Morrow and his men!
Russell sighed. He really wished he could have Ernie by his side, who had been trained in one-to-one combat. Or Ben. He had hated him, but he’d been a good soldier.
I don’t have a choice. I have to take what I can get!
Russell put the jeep into first gear. Then he stepped on the gas and headed toward the transporter compound in the west. He turned around briefly to check the second jeep was following.
We’re completely and utterly screwed!
Chapter 31
After slamming the door in Russell’s face, Marlene went to her little kitchen and fumbled around in the dark for the bottle she’d left there a few hours before. She had a hangover and wanted to get rid of it with the last few drops of liquor——in fact, the last liquor of any kind on New California. It took her a few seconds to find the flat bottle, and she was just about to raise it to her lips when there was another pounding at the door.
Why wouldn’t Russell just leave her in peace! Let Morrow blow up New California! The sooner it was all over, the better.
The noise didn’t cease. Marlene slammed the bottle on the table and stormed to the front door. She opened it, and immediately her face was knocked painfully sideways as someone punched her. Marlene screamed, but more in shock than in pain.
Ellen’s face was one big grimace. “You should be ashamed of yourself! You should be so ashamed!”
“Ashamed?” Albert was dead, goddammit!
“What’s your problem? We trusted you! Russell trusted you! I trusted you! For years we trusted you as our leader and let you run our colony. And now, in our darkest hour, in the moment we need you the most, you just leave us in the lurch? What’s your problem? That Albert has died?” Ellen was screaming now. “Is it because you blame Russell?”
Of course I blame him! He’s responsible for this whole mess!
Marlene opened her mouth to speak, but Ellen didn’t let her. “Don’t speak! Whatever you do, don’t speak. In the fight against the monsters you sent men, women, and children to the frontlines. Ann is a widow, but she still went with Russell. Jenny lost Lee in the transporter, and she still went with Russell. We have so many widows, and children who have lost their father or mother, and nobody ever blamed you! And now you——you of all people——are leaving everyone high and dry because you’re drowning in self-pity?”
Marlene stood motionless in the door. There was nothing she could say in response.
“You of all people!” Ellen repeated, before running off, sobbing.
Marlene felt weak at the knees. In slow motion, she sunk down onto the floorboards.
Ellen was right.
“Self-pity.” She whispered the horrible words to herself again and the truth of them sunk in. She felt no hate toward Russell or anybody else. It had just been an excuse to distract herself from her loss. Ellen was right! She had led the mission against the beasts. She herself had ordered that teenagers should also fight the monsters down at the post. And now several of them were dead.
Marlene began to sob quietly. What had she done?
Russell stopped when they were still about half a mile from the transporter. He took his weapon and jumped out of the jeep, then waved the others over.
“We’ll go the rest of the way on foot. We only have one chance if we want to take them by surprise.”
“What are we going to do?” Jenny asked. Her voice was trembling slightly.
During the drive, Russell had mulled over this very question, but he hadn’t come up with a failsafe plan. “It depends on the situation at the base. They’re not expecting us, and we have to use that to our advantage. We’ll split into two groups. Ken, Sammy, Ann, and I will attack the entrance from the front. The rest of you should creep in from the side. Once we take out the soldiers at the gate, the rest of them will hopefully run to the front and fire at us. And you take the opportunity to shoot as many as possible from behind.”
“That’s pretty drastic. Is it really our goal to kill them all?” Dr. Cashmore asked.
Russell didn’t like the plan either, but what other choice did they have? “There are far more of them than of us. Yesterday I counted almost twenty soldiers in the compound. We only have one chance. We don’t have any time, and this is a matter of life or death. For us and our families! We have to get to the transporter and stop Morrow.”
“And then?” Cashmore asked. “If we actually manage to prevent him carrying out his plan? Then New California is gone in two days anyway.”
Russell shook his head. “We don’t know that. We have to find out what the general is planning and how the transporter can be used as a weapon against the aliens. In the worst-case scenario, we can evacuate and carry it out from another planet. The most important thing now is to gain control of the transporter.”
“And you think it’ll work?” Cashmore was unable to hide the skepticism in his voice.
“If you have a better plan, let me know!” Russell hissed. “All I know is we’re going to die tonight if we don’t do anything.”
“OK, OK,” Cashmore replied in a subdued tone of voice.
“Then let’s go!”
Russell ran ahead, and the others followed him, but after a few seconds he slowed down. They’ll be able to hear us from a couple of hundred of feet away.
“Quieter!” he whispered. “Otherwise we might as well announce our arrival.”
When they were nearly at the compound, Russell raised a hand. “Stay down!” he whispered. “Sammy and I will go ahead and check out the lie of the land!”
They crawled the final few feet to the perimeter fence, being careful to stay hidden behind bushes. Cautiously, Russell made a gap in the bushes with his hands so that he could see into the compound.
What the ...?
“They’re all gone!” Sammy said in surprise.
The compound was deserted, the lights out, and the area lit only by the pale glow of the rising moon. Most of the tents had been dismantled, the equipment had disappeared. A lone generator chugged quietly next to the transporter. A few cables ran from the generator to the outer wall of the transporter and to the only remaining tent. The three jeeps were lined up neatly against the fence.
Clearly Morrow had already sent the soldiers back to Venus. His attack on the aliens must be about to start.
&n
bsp; “Get the others! We’ll meet at the gate. Quickly! We have to get to the transporter!”
Sammy disappeared into the darkness. Russell ran along the fence to the entrance of the base. He pushed open the unlocked gate with his back. He was joined a few seconds later by the others.
“Come on!”
Russell crossed the expanse to the transporter in big bounds. As he passed the tent he looked inside. He saw several computer consoles——some of them were on, bathing the inside of the tent in a dim blue light.
Russell stopped outside the transporter and turned around to the others. “We have to be quick. I’ll open the outer wall and then we storm inside. It’s possible Morrow is inside with a task force. In that case shoot all mercenarys immediately. But for God’s sake, don’t shoot Morrow, because we need him. Is that clear?”
Manuel Sargent nodded.
“You and Ann, lie on the ground. Sammy, Max, and Ken——stand over there! The rest of you, stay behind me!”
Russell waited impatiently for them to take up their positions.
“Everyone ready?” He stretched out his hand to touch the transporter. “Get ready, I’m opening the transporter in five, four, three ...”
Suddenly it was bright as day. Russell screamed. He raised his hand to shield his eyes from the gleaming light of the searchlights.
“Drop your weapons!” came Morrow’s booming voice.
Russell squinted, but was so dazzled by the light he couldn’t see a thing. Despondently, he dropped his weapon. It was pointless to put up a struggle against an enemy that you couldn’t even see. It was a trap! I should have seen it coming. This wouldn’t have happened to Marlene.
“What shall we do?” Ann asked in a despairing voice.
“Drop your weapons! This is your final warning!” Morrow’s voice came from somewhere beyond the light.
“Do as he says,” Russell whispered in resignation. He threw his weapon down into the mud in front of him, pulled the pistol from his holster and laid it on the ground. The others followed suit.
That’s it. It’s over! We’re dead!
Morrow’s soldiers came and picked up the weapons. Manuel screamed as one of the men in uniform kicked him in the back of the knees. Another grabbed Russell from behind and twisted his arms to his back.
The searchlights went out, apart from one that bathed the compound in a dim light. Russell counted twelve armed soldiers who had taken up position around them, and then he saw Morrow, coming toward him from the side. He looked self-satisfied.
“How did you know ...?” Russell croaked, as his guard pushed him toward Morrow.
“I’m not stupid, Harris! When our doctor suddenly disappeared, I knew I could look forward to a revolt. Plus we put up sensors along the forest path to Eridu as soon as we got here, so I had fair warning of your arrival. Luckily, you’ve turned up at a good time. One hour later you could have made things difficult for me. Our plan is extremely time-sensitive.”
“Are you really prepared to sacrifice New California and its population for the sake of your plan?”
“Those are my orders. Besides, there is no alternative. New California would be destroyed in a few hours, anyway.”
“Then at least evacuate the colony to Venus!” Russell hissed between his teeth.
“We don’t have enough supplies on the base to feed that many people until the arrival of the next supply ship. We wouldn’t even have enough oxygen.”
“Then at least let us go to another planet further away from the death zone.”
Morrow shook his head. “There’s not enough time for that. We’ve been working on the transporter since our arrival and couldn’t have put it at your disposal for an evacuation.”
“We have women and children, for God’s sake!”
Russell screamed into the general’s face, but Morrow was unfazed. “Collateral damage for the good of humanity,” he replied curtly. He waved over one of the sergeants. “Tie the attackers to the fence and take their weapons. Check the hand-cuffs carefully, they have to hold for at least an hour.”
The soldier nodded and called over some of his comrades. One of them grabbed Max Lindwall so roughly by the arm he cried out, twisted out of the soldier’s grip and fell head-first into the mud. Russell gasped as he was kicked in the back. He staggered forward toward the perimeter fence. “Fucking bastard,” he gasped. The man behind him just laughed.
“Hold on,” Morrow said. He stepped back into Russell’s field of vision and scrutinized him.
What’s he planning? Is he going to shoot me?
“We’ll take Mr. Harris with us,” the general said finally. “It’s not a bad idea to have one of the colonists to take back to Earth with us for questioning, if the spaceship ever gets us back home.”
Russell was surprised. “Do you really think I would speak in your favor?”
“That’s irrelevant. I am simply carrying out orders. But they will want to know about the colony.” Morrow nodded. “Yes, that’s what we’ll do. Bowers, handcuff him and take him to the transporter.”
Russell saw the soldiers tying his friends to the fence before he was led into the sphere by the guard. The soldiers followed one by one.
Inside, Mitchell was sitting on a folding chair with a laptop perched on his knee. A cable led to a suitcase-sized contraption that Russell recognized as the interface between the computer and the artificial intelligence. Two thick cables led from the interface to the outer wall of the computer. In the middle of the transporter the smaller sphere was hovering calmly, as if unfazed by all the commotion going on around it.
Russell caught Mitchell’s eye. The engineer looked at him regretfully before turning back to his screen. Finally, General Morrow stepped inside and, after scanning the compound one last time, closed the entrance behind him. He looked at his watch.
“We’re still on schedule,” he said in satisfaction, and marched past Russell to Mitchell. “Are you ready? Is everything prepared?”
“Yes,” came the engineer’s monosyllabic reply.
“Good, then let’s begin evacuation. Start the connection to Venus!” Morrow ordered.
Mitchell pressed a key on his laptop. For a few seconds nothing happened, then the little sphere in the middle of the transporter suddenly disappeared. Russell knew already what would happen next. And he was right: a blue light appeared and quickly spread until it enveloped the entire transporter. Mitchell was in the process of creating a permanent connection to Venus. The room was contorted into the elongated egg shape Russell had experienced during the experiments on Venus.
“Connection complete,” Mitchell said. His voice and his face expressed profound disapproval. Dr. Payne was right. Morrow must have forced him to do the work. Russell wondered where Dr. Hope was. Maybe he was coordinating the mission from the Venus side. Maybe Russell could get to Mitchell and convince him to sabotage the plans. On the other hand, what would he gain?
“Morrow! What the hell are you up to?” he cried. He wanted to approach the general, but his guard held him in a vice.
Morrow ignored him completely. He turned to his men. “Everyone except Task Force Magenta can return to Venus,” he said calmly.
The majority of the soldiers started moving toward the other end of the connected transporters.
“What about Harris?” asked the man behind Russell.
Morrow turned. “Take him to Venus and lock him up. I’ll deal with him when I get back.”
Bowers, or whatever the soldier was called, dragged Russell along with him. The first soldier had already made it to the other end of the egg-shaped room and made an opening in the other sphere. Russell could see into the transporter lab on Venus. He had to find a way of staying here, otherwise everything was lost.
“General!” he cried. “Let me take part in your mission! You owe me that!”
Morrow laughed. “I don’t owe you anything, Harris!”
“We risked our asses for you on Venus. I risked my ass for you on Venus.”
“I regard that as reparation for what you did in Nevada. Bowers, take him away!”
“General, you’re forgetting something!” Russell’s mind was racing. Whatever he said now was his last chance. The general had started to turn away when he had an idea. “You want to take me back to Earth as a witness! But if I don’t see what you do, I can’t tell them anything!”
The general laughed again, but Russell could see he had struck a nerve.
“Sir?” Bowers asked.
The seconds passed slowly as Morrow mulled over Russell’s words. Finally he nodded. “Alright. Bowers, let Harris go. He’ll stay with me.”
Russell breathed a sigh of relief. Slowly he walked back to Morrow. His hands were still handcuffed behind his back. Apart from five heavily armed soldiers, the soldiers had all returned to Venus and the entrance had closed.
“Harris, you need to behave. If you try anything stupid, I will shoot you without warning, is that clear?”
Russell did not react to the threat. Step by step he sidled over to Mitchell, until he was finally standing next to him. Mitchell was still tapping away on his laptop.
The general didn’t appear to want to prevent him. When he turned to discuss something with his soldiers, Russell spoke to Mitchell. “What’s he planning? What’ll happen?” he whispered.
Mitchell looked up at Russell. “Something terrible.”
Russell got goose bumps just from the tone of his voice. “Could you still stop it?”
Mitchell shook his head. “I want to live, Harris!”
“At the cost of all the men, women, and children of New California?”
“The planet will be gone in a few hours anyway. And Venus would be next!”
“But you could——”
“Harris!” Morrow had appeared next to him and pushed him away from Mitchell. “Let the man get on with his work. Stay away from him!”
“Then tell me what you’re planning, damn it!”
Morrow looked at his watch. “You’ll see for yourself in a moment. It’s time. Mitchell, start with Stage One.”
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