by David Wood
“Leaving us with Stalkers.”
“Tip of the iceberg, I’m afraid.”
Peter’s body had gone rigid with tension, but Ella’s iceberg comment twisted the muscles in his back into tight balls. “What do you mean?”
“Apply the same junk DNA scenario to other species. Not just mankind. Not just predators. And not just mammals.”
“What, like fish?” There were already giant killers in the ocean, and the Blue Whale was the largest animal to ever exist on the planet. While an ocean full of predators wasn’t a pleasant thought, they were smack dab in the middle of the country, thousands of miles from the nearest shore.
Ella shook her head. “Birds.”
“Birds?” The first thing he realized upon speaking the word, was that he hadn’t actually seen a bird in a long time. That realization sparked his imagination. The first bird that came to mind was the extinct, South American Phorusrhacos. He’d seen a documentary about the giant, flightless bird. Eight feet tall, three hundred pounds and predatory. But it didn’t sound much worse than the Stalkers she had described. He pictured the large bird and thought it looked a lot like a... “Dinosaur.”
Ella gave him a sheepish grin, confirming the hypothesis.
He felt incredulous. “There are dinosaurs out there?”
Thankfully, she shook her head. “But there are animals with dinosaur traits. Remember, all genes going back to the beginning of life on Earth have been unlocked. The genetic Pandora’s Box has been opened. If a dinosaur trait is advantageous, a species—or even an individual—will quickly adopt it. Rapid evolution. And that’s what really makes them so dangerous. Once you find a way to beat them, they’ll change. That’s why we need to leave before they get here.”
“Because you’ve been in this situation before?”
“Twice.”
“Other biodomes?” When Ella had contacted him all those years ago, telling him to not eat the food, to build a biodome, he heeded her warning and allowed a crew, hired by her, to build the structure. Kristen had hated the idea, mostly because it had come from Ella, but he knew Ella wouldn’t lie. Even if he had become untrustworthy because of Ella, his trust in her was implicit. Part of him wanted to believe she was merely looking out for him, because of what they’d had. But now it seemed there had been an alternate reason. “You’re moving from one dome to the next, aren’t you?”
She didn’t even try to deny it. “There’s a network of domes around the country, most built using funds I made from ExoGen. I am stopping at some I come across on the way, but I didn’t build them for that purpose. Especially yours. If it weren’t for Anne, I wouldn’t have come here. But...”
“But what?”
“I knew you would protect her. It’s selfish, I know. But I can’t do this without you.”
“Do what?”
“Turn the key the other way.”
“How? Where?”
“There’s a lab, off the coast of Boston. I had it built, but the world fell apart before I could get there.”
“And you want me, and my son, to escort you there?” His words were nearly a growl “You want us to risk my family’s life? I already lost Kristen, and now you—”
“Your family is already at risk,” Ella said.
“We are now,” he said.
Ella shook her head. “I wasn’t talking about you. Or Jakob.”
Peter’s heart skipped a beat. Were Ella’s feelings for him still so fresh that she was talking about herself? He considered it and realized it might be possible. His own feelings for her, forged over a lifetime, hadn’t changed much. But then she simultaneously revealed the truth and secured his aid.
“It’s Anne. She’s your daughter.”
Chapter 10
If there was one thing Peter Crane was good at, it was preparing for the unknown, whether that be a bad crop year, an enemy ambush or even Ella’s Stalkers. But the bombshell she just dropped hit him with the shock and awe of Hiroshima’s atomic blast. He stood up straight, as though electrified, stumbled back and caught himself on the kitchen counter. Ella’s reappearance into his life was always tumultuous, but this...
Attempting to concisely express his mixed feelings about the revelation, he condensed it all into a single word. “Bullshit.”
Ella looked aghast. Then angry. “Bullshit? Bullshit? I tell you that we, that you and I, have a daughter and that’s your response? Bullshit?”
“Yes,” he said. “I don’t buy it.”
“You think I’m just telling you that to...what? To guilt you into helping us?”
“It would work,” he said. “And you know that.”
“Whether or not the knowledge forces you to help us, doesn’t make it a lie.”
“How did you raise her?” he asked, knowing she’d understand the context. She was a busy woman in a powerful position at a growing company. She worked late. Sometimes she didn’t go home. She lived her work. How could she have a baby, let alone raise a daughter?
“I was in the office when I went into labor,” she said. “Took a week off to recover. Worked remotely for another week. And then I went back. I wasn’t a good mother. Anne was raised by daycares, school and nannies. I’ve only really gotten to know her in the past two years. Is that what you wanted to hear? Does it ease your guilt, knowing that I was a shitty parent?”
“Guilt?” he said. “I didn’t even know she existed. Had you told me, I would have—”
“Taken her,” Ella said. “You would have come back to New Mexico and taken her. You would have done right by her. You’d have raised her, with Kristen. And I...I would have let you. I’d have lost her to Kristen, just like I lost you.”
That took the wind out of his sails. But it didn’t prove his stance wrong. “I still don’t believe you.”
Ella closed her eyes. Rubbed circles into her temples with her fingers. “Telling you about her was not meant to coax you into helping me.”
“Prove it.”
She stood up, rounded the island and stabbed a finger at his face. “You already know I’m telling the truth, because both you and I know that you would have helped me regardless. Because that’s who you are to me and who I am to you. It’s who we’ve always been. Other relationships didn’t change that. Distance never changed that. Time never changed that. I could have come here by myself, and you would have come with me. I’m telling you about her because I want you to protect her first. Before me. The only way to get you to do that was to tell you the truth about her.”
Peter could feel his blood pressure dropping. She was right about him. About them. But did that mean she was telling the truth about Anne? The girl was the right age, but the verdict was still out. He’d try to see it in the girl’s face. In her eyes. Believing he had a daughter, and adjusting to that idea, would take time. Time they didn’t have. If they made it to Boston and the lab waiting for Ella, maybe he’d request a paternity test. It’d be a dick move, but Maury Povich made a living from such revelations, not just because men are dogs, but because the connection between a father and his bloodline was a powerful thing.
“How much time do we have?” he asked. “Do they hunt in the day?”
“They do,” she said. “But only when agitated or ravenous. Most of the species I’ve seen still operate this way, so moving during the day is still the safest course...”
“I’m sensing a ‘but’ coming.”
“But...these Stalkers. They hold a grudge. They’ve been following us for two weeks. We managed to avoid them by crossing rivers—they don’t like water, but eventually they find their way across—and by hiding in trees. They’re horrible climbers. They nearly had us two days ago, but I used the last of my C4 to bring down a train tunnel.”
“Is that when this happened?” he asked, pointing at the bandaged claw marks.
She nodded. “One of them made it through before I detonated the explosive. I killed it with the machete.”
“You’ve changed.” He looked her up and down
. She was certainly more solidly built than she had been twelve years previous. Harder. But he still had trouble picturing her blowing up train tunnels with C4 and fighting monsters with a machete.
“Yeah, well, I hope you haven’t. Look, best guess, the ones that survived, made their way back out and around, are a day behind us.”
“You’ve already been here fourteen hours,” he pointed out.
“And that’s a guess. They could be closer, especially if they’re moving through the daylight.”
This was all happening too fast. To make the kind of decision she was asking him to make, to uproot and endanger his son, he couldn’t be rushed. Not without good cause. “So what’s the plan, then? Continue across the country, holing up in biodomes you had built, until you reach Boston? Find this lab and ‘turn the key’ back?”
“Essentially, yes.”
“Without a map?”
“You know I don’t need one.”
Ella had an uncanny memory. If she set herself to the task of memorizing something, like a map of the United States and the locations of biodomes—locations that she had chosen—he believed she was capable. “What about the science? Is it possible to turn the key? And before you answer, you should know that you’re standing above a bunker that has nothing to do with the biodome you had built, which is strong enough to withstand a nuclear blast, not to mention a hundred of your Stalkers—”
“They’re not my Stalkers.”
“—and that’s if they could even find the entrance. So for me to seriously consider what you’re saying, it better be damn convincing. Now...is it possible to reverse this? To put things back the way they were?”
“Anything is possible,” she said. “I think we’ve proven that. But if you’re asking if this is something I’ve already made progress on, then no. Is there anyone else left alive that has any chance of undoing this hell? The answer to that question is an absolute ‘no.’ This is a Hail Mary play. I get it. But it’s either that, or wait for the seeds to get inside, or for something hungry to come knocking. I wouldn’t be doing this...wouldn’t be putting Anne at risk, if I didn’t think it was possible. You understand risk assessment. Is a world full of edible food and free of ExoGenetic predators worth the risk of dying a little sooner than fate has already scheduled? You tell me.”
The best answer he could come up with was silence. But someone else gave an answer for him. “I think it is.”
Peter turned to find Jakob and Anne standing in the dining room doorway. Seeing them standing together, Jakob was a foot and a half taller than the girl. Peter looked from one face to the other. Their eyes, dark brown, matched each other’s. Matched his.
Two kids...
Under other circumstances he’d have been thrilled. Even if Kristen had still been alive. A daughter? Holy shit. But it also meant he had even more to risk. Also more to gain. If they could undo the genetic modifications unleashed on the world, then their children might not just have their lives, they might have futures.
“Did you hear me?” Jakob asked. “I’m tired of sitting here and doing nothing. If we can do something about it, we have to.”
“It’s not that easy,” Peter said.
Jakob crossed his arms. “Why not? Because it’s dangerous? Believing we’re safe here means pretending that Mom didn’t—”
“Enough,” Peter said, his voice stern, not because he was angry at the boy, but because he didn’t want to open that can of worms. Not with Ella, and not right now. He took a moment to collect himself, and then said, “If we do this, every single one of you does exactly what I say, at all times, without questioning and without hesitation.” He looked at Ella. “I don’t care if you’ve survived out there for months, or a year, or however long you’ve been traveling; you can’t do what I can do.”
“But—” Anne said, before Ella silenced her with a raised hand.
Ella turned to Peter. “Fine. We’ll do things your way.”
“For as long as it works,” Anne said, eyebrows raised in challenge.
Peter had to fight his smile. He saw himself in her with every passing second. “Okay, then. Now let’s—”
“The wheat is moving.” It was Anne again, but all the toughness had left her voice. She sounded like a little girl again. Her eyes were fixated on the field outside the kitchen window above the sink.
Peter kept everyone else from moving by holding out his hand, and tip-toeing to the window. He leaned out slowly, looking through the window, which was covered by a sheer shade. He could see the wheat fifty feet away, but the fabric reduced the detail, making it a silhouette. The wheat was indeed moving, bending with the wind. He was about to say so when he noticed a subtle aberration. While most of the wheat stalks gave way to the breeze, some of them remained rigid and upright.
Not as smart as they think.
He stepped back from the window. “How long do we have?”
“They’re here already?”
“What’s here?” Jakob asked.
“Big booties,” Anne whispered.
Jakob’s eyes widened. “Stalkers? You mean, they’re real?”
Peter put his hands on Ella’s arms. “Ell, how long?”
The answer to his question didn’t come from Ella, it came from the front door, as something large and heavy threw itself against the wood.
Chapter 11
“Take them to the basement,” Peter said to Jakob.
“Huddle?” Jakob asked, and Ella realized he was speaking in code.
Peter shook his head. “Extra points.”
Code based on football. Great.
Plan or not, retreating to a basement, fortified or not, sounded like a horrible idea to Ella. As strategically smart as Peter was, locking themselves below ground would only prolong their demise. The Stalkers were persistent, and patient. She opened her mouth to say as much, but he cut her short.
“Not a word,” he said, pushing her toward Jakob, who was leading Anne to the back of the house.
“But—” was all Ella managed to say.
“I might not know very much about them.” He motioned to the door, which received and withstood another impact. “But they know nothing about me. And if we’re being honest, your knowledge in that regard is also fairly outdated.”
“That works both ways,” she argued.
“Agreed,” he said. “But this is my house. You’re just going to get in the way.”
Jakob opened the basement door, stepped inside and motioned Anne to follow. The girl looked to her mother for the go ahead, but when the door shuddered once more, she made up her own mind, following Jakob down the stairs.
“We don’t have much time,” Peter said.
The door was hit again. This time, the distinct sound of cracking wood merged with the wall shaking like a rattle. Peter and Ella leaned into the hall. There was a hairline crack at the center of the door, but it was still in one piece, still dead-bolted and barricaded with a thick hardwood plank. But it wouldn’t last. She’d seen stronger blockades fall to a continued barrage. The Stalker leading the attack was always the largest male, but when he didn’t have any luck, he’d call in help from the real hunters—the females. Working together, the female Stalkers would make short work of the door. She was almost out of time.
Ella took Peter’s arm in her hand. “You’ll protect your daughter?”
Peter looked her in the eyes, and she saw that same, deep earnest gaze she’d fallen in and out of love with for decades.
“No one is going to die here today,” he said. “But you have to listen to me. Go. Now.”
She kissed his cheek and ran for the basement door. To her surprise, he ran in the opposite direction, heading upstairs. She felt herself pulled back, wanting to help. To fight. She’d stood her ground so often and fought her way across the country... She was unaccustomed to letting someone else fight her battles. But she knew this was a losing fight. If Peter had an ace up his sleeve, she had to let him play it.
The front do
or shook again, the sound of it chasing her around the basement door. She nearly shouted in surprise as Jakob’s face emerged from the dark stairwell below her. Anne was behind him, lower on the stairs. Behind her was a metal door with a metal wheel, like something from a submarine.
“Dad’s upstairs?” Jakob asked. When Ella nodded, he lifted his wrist and started a countdown. “He’ll be down in forty-five seconds.”
The boy moved past Anne, spun the wheel and opened the metal door to absolute darkness. To Ella’s surprise and relief, he flipped the light switch, illuminating the space beyond. “Let’s go,” he said, waving them on.
“Won’t that exhaust the battery?” Ella asked, pointing at the light.
“Doesn’t matter,” he said and stepped onto the basement’s concrete floor.
She followed Jakob into the basement. Her eyes went wide. The space was massive, at least twice the footprint of the house above, constructed beneath the concrete barricade outside. The walls were lined with shelves covered in canned goods, dehydrated food and various supplies. Enough for two people to live for years. And it all looked untouched. In the past two years, neither father nor son had eaten anything but what the biodome had provided. The more she observed Jakob, the more she saw his father in him. Confident. Disciplined. Compassionate.
Jakob hurried across the broad open space, moving past cots and crates, heading for the back of the room. He held Anne’s hand, whispering to her. Ella couldn’t make out the words, but the tone was calm and consoling.
Just like his father.
From upstairs, she heard the front door crack again. “Should I close this?”
“Leave it open,” Jakob said. “Dad will be here in twenty seconds. And hurry up.”
Another impact set her in motion. The frequency of attacks on the front door was increasing, and the hits were harder. The females had joined the assault. Twenty seconds might be too long. C’mon Pete, hurry up.