They flew on, veering to the right of the smoke column. She watched it tower upward as they passed. The air in the plane grew acrid and unbreathable, so she pulled out her scarf and covered her mouth.
Gordon started coughing uncontrollably.
Soon they were past the fire, and he pointed out a small runway in the distance. “Let’s just hope we can land.” He started the descent. H124 searched the ground for any sign of the Death Riders. She didn’t see any vehicles moving, nor any encampments spread out below them. Just the old runway.
Gordon steered the plane down. It jittered and shimmied, and she watched his brow wrinkle. “It’s the heat. The air is so light it makes it hard to land.” Heat waves shimmered off the broken runway, distorting the air in front of the plane. “Don’t worry. I deal with this all the time.”
She gripped the door handle as the wheels touched down with a screech. They jostled and bumped down the runway as a huge crack in the pavement loomed before them.
“What about that?” she asked, pointing forward.
“Brace yourself.”
She clutched the handle harder, and they hopped over the crack, going airborne for a moment. Then the wheels screeched home again, and the plane started to slow, rumbling down the decrepit landing field.
Gordon grinned. “Smooth as ice.”
Her knuckles had turned white on the door handle. “Real smooth.”
He taxied down the broken runway to a set of methane tanks at the end. They passed old hangars, most of them collapsed, but a few remained upright. Their walls yawned with huge, rusted holes. Each time they passed one of the erect buildings, Gordon glimpsed nervously into their darkened openings.
“What is it?”
“Just that . . .” He peered into another building, then stopped the plane in front of the methane tanks. His eyes narrowed. “I don’t see anyone.”
She gave a second look too. “Me either.”
“Let’s go.” He climbed out of the plane and hurried to the tanks. She got out as well, helping him with the bulky refueling hose. As he fitted the connector into the plane’s tank, she turned on the pump. It coughed and thrummed, then started up.
“Color me amazed!” he shouted.
“What?”
“They actually left some fuel in here for a change. Usually I have to access the underground backup tanks at this airfield.”
As they refueled, they scanned the area nervously. Then H124 realized why there was still methane in the tanks. The sudden roar of dozens of engines fired up from the top of the hill above them. Vehicles streamed down, throwing up clouds of dirt behind them. It was a trap.
“Death Riders!” Gordon cursed. “How much we got to go?”
H124 looked at the gauge. “We’re about a third full!”
“Keep going! Just get ready to run back to the plane as soon as you shut off the pump!”
She nodded, as a chilling war cry rang from the Death Riders and their vehicles.
“They’ll leave us for dead and take the plane!” Gordon shouted above the din. “How full are we?”
She looked at the gauge. “Almost half!”
“Just a little more, and we’re good!”
The vehicles roared onto the airfield, maneuvering between the old hangars. She could see spikes mounted on the backs of their cars, bolstering a series of strange spheres. The Death Riders screamed out as they stood up in massive trucks.
She looked at the gauge. A little more than half full.
The Death Riders thundered closer, now just a few hundred meters away. She could see the mounted spheres better now. Some were red and glistening, others brown-and-black. Some had slick flowing streamers attached. Then she realized that they weren’t spheres.
They were human heads.
Chapter 26
H124 watched in horror as the Death Riders drew closer, the mounted skulls on their cars dripping with gore and decay. Some heads had been skinned, revealing gleaming muscle and the white flash of bone.
“Where we at?” Gordon yelled.
“About three-fourths full!”
“Good enough! Kill the pump!”
She shut it off and made for the plane while he dumped the hose and ran to the pilot door, wrenching it open.
She buckled in as he started up the propeller, and they taxied down the runway. “Damn it!” he grumbled.
“What is it?”
“We don’t have enough room. We’re going to have to spin around.”
As he slowed the plane and pivoted it, H124 stared down the runway at the wall of approaching cars. The Death Riders howled and cheered, guns and spears thrust into the air. One of the cars was mounted with a huge gun like she’d seen in Black Canyon Camp. “Will they fire at us?”
“Probably not. They wouldn’t want to damage the plane.” He leaned forward, building up speed. But they weren’t moving fast enough. “Holy hell,” Gordon breathed. “We’ll have to hop them.”
“Hop them?” Her voice cracked.
“Hold on.”
He revved the plane and surged down the runway, streaming headlong toward the oncoming marauders. She gripped the seat, watching the distance close between them. They were going to crash. Smash right into them. And their heads would end up mounted on those spikes.
A hundred meters. Then fifty. When they were almost on top of the Death Riders, Gordon pulled back on the stick. Lacking the speed to take off, they darted up into the air, hopping right over the line of cars. He touched down on the other side, racing down the runway, past the old hangar buildings, bouncing over the gigantic crack again. At the edge of the strip, Gordon pulled back on the controls, lifting the plane into the air. She felt her stomach dip toward her feet, then a surge of relief as they careened into the sky.
“Woooohoooo!” Gordon shouted, pumping a fist skyward.
She turned in her seat to look back to the runway. The Death Riders had stopped, a huge cloud of dust settling behind them. One shook his fist at them. She grinned.
“Nice flying!” She clapped him on the back.
“Thank you, ma’am.”
She leaned back in her seat. “Do we have enough fuel to make it to the next airfield?”
He looked at the gauge. “We should make it.”
She closed her eyes and relaxed her body, listening to the drone of the engine. They flew for an hour in silence, basking in the warmth of the cabin. Then she opened her eyes, staring out into the blue. On the western horizon, gray clouds had started to form, building up into giant anvils.
“Do you remember when the weather wasn’t crazy all the time?” she asked.
He scratched his chin. “Not really, though my grandparents told me stories. They said that when they were little, their grandparents grew corn on a little plot of land.”
“What’s corn?”
“It was an edible plant. Said you could make all kinds of food from it. My grandfather was particularly fond of something called popcorn.”
They looked down upon the parched brown land beneath them. There lay miles of dried riverbeds, braiding across the dusty plains.
“They could even make fuel from the corn. Must have been right around here somewhere. They said the whole land was once green, that lots of people grew food out here.”
She surveyed the barren wasteland. “Hard to imagine.”
“It wasn’t the Badlands back then. That name came later.”
“What changed? Do you know?”
“My grandparents used to talk about something called carbon capture farms, how they were supposed to change everything, calm the weather and all that.”
“And what happened?”
“Well, I guess it didn’t work quite the way they thought it would.”
“How was it supposed to work?” she asked.
He shrugg
ed. “Beats me. But from what they said, it was supposed to absorb the bad air. Only it wasn’t enough. My grandmother used to say it was like trying to patch a leaky boat with a sponge.”
She thought of the old PRD with the videos that described geoengineering. “Did they ever talk about some kind of particles that were released into the air?”
He nodded. “Hell, yes. My grandfather used to bitch about that all the time. Said it messed up everything for his grandparents. The Apollo Project.”
“Yes! That’s it!”
“It was supposed to keep heat trapped way up high, but instead it built up, and came crashing down one day. My grandfather said it was like a scorching tidal wave pressing down on the world. The storms got really bad after that.”
“I heard it descended because the people who’d been releasing the particles decided to spend the money on video surveillance instead. So someone else just sent up different particles.”
“Figures. My dad used to say that ignorance was one of the paving stones on the road to disaster.”
She looked over at him. “Really? What else paved the road?”
He looked far out his window. “Greed, arrogance . . . violence, hubris . . .”
She’d never heard the last word before. “What’s hubris?”
“Thinking you’re a god,” he said.
She squinted in the sunlight, toward the towering gray clouds building in the far west. The tiny plane flew in that direction.
“Should we be worried about those?”
He smiled. “Not until we have to fly into them.”
She sighed, readjusting her weight in the seat. The drone of the propeller filled the cabin, and the swaying of the plane made her a little sleepy. She fought the urge to close her eyes, so she studied the ground below. Great expanses of dust billowed upward, sweeping over the hills and valleys. As far as she could see, no twinkle of water caught the sunlight. The storm-swollen rivers of the east didn’t extend this far inland; instead the thirsty country choked on dirt and dust.
Still her eyes longed to close, and at last she let them, leaning her head against the seat.
She awoke suddenly as the plane jolted upward. “What’s going on?” she said, sitting up straight.
“Will you take a look at that?” Gordon said, pointing down. “Well, I’ll be.”
She followed his gaze down, spotting a vast stretch of verdant trees.
“What do you make of that?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
“I think we need to take a look. You game?”
“Sure.”
He brought the plane down near the edge of the trees, wheels touching down on a flat stretch of brown earth. Up ahead the world was green. “What about Death Riders?” she asked.
He opened the pilot door. “Death Riders don’t have nothing to do with this.” He gave a low whistle, then jogged toward the trees. “Come and look at this, will ya?”
She caught up to him. A sudden gust of wind brought with it a wonderfully sweet smell. It was the best air she’d ever breathed. She felt invigorated. She walked to the edge of the forest and placed her hands on either side of a tree. Its jade leaves rustled in the wind. She pressed her face against it.
“Where did all these trees come from?” Gordon asked, moving among them. “This beats all!”
She followed him, breathing deeply, listening to the sighs of the leaves. After the isolation of her life in New Atlantic, the violence of the Badlanders, the barren landscapes, she felt like she’d stepped into something truly magical. A beautiful sound rang out between the trees. It was as if someone were singing, or perhaps whistling. “What’s that?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
She followed the sound, walking deeper into the forest. She heard it again and again, originating from somewhere high up. She jumped suddenly. Something flew from one tree to another in the overhead branches. It landed on a limb and began to sing again. She recognized it from one of her field guides. It was a bird. “There!” she said, pointing.
Gordon watched it with her. Then another one joined it, and they sat together on the branch. “Well, will you look at that!” Gordon exclaimed.
Between the trees grew shorter plants. She recognized some of them from the books: ferns, shrubs, and the like. Something rustled in them, and a furry head lifted out. A large brown animal walked past, munching on leaves. From its head grew two pointy bones, with other protrusions branching off. It watched them with big, watery brown eyes, chewing all the while. Then it moved off into the trees.
She looked over at Gordon, who stood there staring, mouth agape. “This is . . .”
H124 turned in a complete circle, the surrounding forest welcoming her. Then she noticed something gray up in a tree. It was smooth and sleek, with a black window in it. Some kind of technology. “Look at that,” she said, pointing.
“It’s a monitoring device. I’ve seen them before.”
Fear gripped her. “PPC?”
“Nope. Seen one like it in a weather shelter.”
“Rover tech?”
“I think so.”
She waved at it. “Hey! Can you hear me?”
“Don’t think it works like that. It’s not a live feed or anything. It just records data now and again. The one I saw seemed to be recording rainfall and humidity.”
“So they’re monitoring the place.” She thought of Raven’s video, the one where he mentioned how the Rovers had been talking about planting forests again. This must be one of them. Trees planted to absorb CO2 from the atmosphere.
“This is amazing,” Gordon said. “But where did these animals come from? They died out long ago.”
“Maybe the Rovers managed to save some of them.”
He stared up at the two birds. “I guess so.”
They wandered through the forest, spotting more birds and other four-legged elegant animals. She made a mental note to look them up in her field guide when they got back to the plane.
For a while they sat down at the base of a tree, listening to the singing in the branches, watching the sunlight filter down to the forest floor. She felt something here, something powerful stirring inside her, like a lost piece of a puzzle clicking into place.
“Well, I guess we better mosey,” Gordon said, getting up and brushing dirt off his pants.
She stood reluctantly. “All right.”
Together they walked back to the plane, taking their time, breathing it all in. A small metal box at the base of one tree caught her eye. She went to it. The box looked identical to the ones she’d seen in the weather shelters that held Raven’s video entries. She bent down and opened it, finding a PRD inside. It was newer than the previous ones.
“What’d you find?” Gordon asked.
“Another PRD. I’m going to copy the contents.” She started up the PRD, finding it still partially charged. Indeed, it was full of video entries. She pulled out her PRD and paired the two devices, copying over the contents onto her own. Then she gently placed the Rover PRD back into the box and latched it closed.
“What do you think’s on it?” he asked.
“If it’s like the other ones, it’ll have history lessons explaining how the planet got to be the way it is.”
“Cheerful stuff, then.”
She laughed. “Very cheerful.”
They walked back to the plane. She looked forward to watching more of Raven’s videos. As they lifted off and flew away, she craned around in her seat to watch the green patch grow smaller.
“That was something,” Gordon said.
“Indeed.
They flew on in pleasant silence, staring out as they did. Her eyes burned, and though she fought against it, she slipped into sleep again, dreaming only of green.
H124 jerked awake as the plane dipped. “What is it?”
She rubbed her eyes and peered out through the windscreen. Great clouds of gray clustered all around them. She couldn’t see ahead, nor the ground below. She didn’t understand how Gordon could possibly know where he was going.
He kept glancing nervously at the altimeter and adjusting his controls, looking at the flight plan he’d created on his PRD. “Supposed to be a mountain pass right here. We’re almost out of fuel. If I turn back, we’re dead in the air.” He looked again at the altimeter. “We should be okay.”
For a moment she thought he was right. The winds died down a little, and they flew on smoothly. Then a sudden surge of air pushed them down. The plane dipped, then another gust hit them, shoving them down even farther.
“Oh, hell!” Gordon shouted as a third downdraft sent them plummeting out of control. The altimeter said they were low now, too low. He flipped on the landing lights, illuminating the space beneath them.
She saw shapes looming up, strange spires caught in the lights. Dead trees, she realized. The plane grazed down among them, their branches scraping and splintering along the bottom of the plane.
Gordon gripped the controls, teeth bared, sweat streaming down his temples. “They just might slow us down enough . . .”
A ripping of metal filled the cabin. She gripped the door handle and seat, feet braced against the floor. The plane screamed toward the ground, the trees below pummeling its underbelly. A tall one loomed up huge in the lights, and she shielded her face as it passed right by the windshield and collided with the right wing of the plane, tearing it off with a deafening squeal. The plane started to spin, thrown violently by the collision, and her head slammed into the passenger window as they hit more trees. Then they bounced, scraping along the ground. Rocks and stumps jarred the plane as it slid, each new strike against a dead tree tossing it about. Her hands flew out, trying to brace herself, one on the door, the other on the instrument panel in front of her. She squeezed her eyes shut, praying for the plane to stop moving. She tried to look over at Gordon, but another collision sent her head snapping back, slamming into the headrest.
They hit with a force so hard that all the air in her lungs rushed out. She flew forward, the seat belt biting into her flesh, her teeth clacking together. Her eyes closed against their will. A rain of glass shattered in on them as something huge splintered through the windshield. It sliced through the side of her face, and after she reached the full restraint of her belt she slammed back violently into the seat. Every bone jarred, every muscle strained.
Shattered Roads Page 24