X grabbed a bottle of anti-inflammatory medicine he had overlooked earlier, and returned to the garage. Parked inside were two motorcycles, a jeep, an armored truck, and a pickup truck. He had managed to get only one of the old-world vehicles to work. He selected a wrench from the wall of tools and walked over to his new ride.
The motorcycle was finally rust-free after several sandblasting sessions and had a new coat of matte-black primer. The garage was equipped with every tool needed to restore the vehicle. He had patched the old tires and filled them with air, salvaged enough fuel cells from the armory to power the bike, and overhauled the engine, replacing the valves and piston rings. But the most impressive feat was the wheels.
X bent down to examine the foot-long blade jutting from either end of the front hub. They would slice through poisonous foliage, and if any beasts got in his way, they would get a nice haircut.
He checked the gears next. The highest gear still needed replacing, but that was fine—traveling at 150 miles per hour on a highway that hadn’t seen maintenance for over two centuries didn’t sound like the brightest idea anyway. He finished tightening the final bolt on the seat he had built for Miles, and stepped back to admire his work.
Two saddlebags hung from the sides, stuffed full of gear, supplies, and food. Miles even had his own compartment, which X had welded onto the back of the bike using spare parts, even padding it with pieces of carpet. Everything was set. All he needed to do now was finish packing his gear.
X moved out of the garage and into the office that had served as his bedroom. Miles, who had been snoozing on the cot, looked up and wagged his tail.
“You ready to go, boy?” X asked. His voice came out scratchy. Something caught in his throat, and he bent over, coughing. He hacked and spat, and this time there was blood.
X reached up with one hand and placed his fingers on his throat. His pulse was racing. There was something wrong with his body that radiation pills and antibiotics couldn’t fend off.
He stared at the blood for another moment. Miles whined, sensing that something was off.
“I’ll be fine,” X tried to say, but the words sparked another coughing fit.
He forced down one of the anti-inflammatory pills with some water. The cool liquid felt good on his throat, though he doubted the medicine would do much. After nearly a decade in the radioactive wasteland that once was Earth, X feared that his time was almost up. He just needed to hold it together long enough to finish his journey.
X grabbed his armor and their radiation suits and motioned for Miles to follow him to the garage. Once they were secured in their suits, helmets on, he picked Miles up and placed him in the back. Hot breath steamed the inside of Miles’ helmet, but he seemed comfortable enough buckled into his makeshift seat.
After heaving open the garage door, X stepped back to check the long tunnel that sloped up nearly three hundred feet to a second blast door. He had already opened the outer door earlier this morning to check for contacts. Sporadic blue flashes glowed at the top of the ramp. The violent storm hadn’t let up at all in the days since he found the bunker.
He hopped on the bike and turned the key. The engine purred. He had tested the vehicle on the tarmac aboveground a few times, laying it down only once while learning how to ride it. He was still nervous, but hey, it couldn’t be any more dangerous than diving.
X coughed as he steered the heavy bike to the garage door. Before leaving, he paused to look at the radio equipment at the other end of the room. A partially intact skeleton—the only human remains X had found in this place—sat in the chair facing it. He considered trying to send a message to those who had left him behind. If they were somehow still up there, they could use the supplies in this bunker.
No. They’re gone. It’s just you and Miles.
X gunned the engine, accelerating out of the garage and up the slope toward the open blast door. Lightning flashed across the skyline. Miles let out a bark that X could hear over the rumble of the bike.
“It’s okay!” X shouted. His throat was still scratchy, but the water had helped soothe it for now.
The bike wobbled a little, but he was still getting the hang of riding. He slowed as he approached the door, and brought the bike to a stop to look out over the landscape. The map he had used to find this place showed an interstate system that should eventually bring him to the ocean. He checked his rifle in the scabbard he had mounted on the side of the bike. The blaster was holstered on his thigh, and the pistol in the duty belt around his waist. If they met any Sirens, he had plenty of firepower within easy reach.
There was no reason to linger, but for some reason, X couldn’t bring himself to drive onto the tarmac. He stared at the remains of an old airship nearby, now nothing more than aluminum ribs. This wasn’t the first time he had seen it, but it made him think of the people in the sky again. Maybe he should send that message after all and let them know there were more fuel cells and rations down here.
His brain flashed through fragmented memories. Blurred faces, distant voices, and a word …
Tin.
The word didn’t mean anything to him, yet it made him inexplicably sad. In his mind’s eye, he saw a locker with a picture of a bird over it, but the image faded, replaced by a winged monster pulling X down to the snowy surface of Hades. Funny how he had no trouble remembering the name of hell. That was something he would never forget, no matter how much time passed.
For several minutes, he sat in the entrance to the bunker, staring at the wreck of the ancient airship. The pain of isolation had never truly healed. But it had transformed into anger. Anger at being left behind. Anger at the devastation the human race had wrought on the surface. Anger that Miles had to live in a radiation suit instead of being able to run and play.
He would not send a message about the supplies this time. The bastards didn’t deserve it. Instead, he twisted the throttle. They shot out onto the tarmac. Miles barked behind him, but he kept his focus on the road and on the speedometer that he had linked to his HUD. The numbers ticked upward.
Thirty miles an hour … forty.
He gave the engine more juice and felt the jolt of sudden acceleration. Miles stopped barking, and X looked over his shoulder to see that the dog had hunkered down.
Fifty miles an hour.
His eyes flitted from his HUD to the broken road. The tires thumped over the cracks, and he maneuvered around a plate of broken asphalt. He was rapidly closing in on the ruined airship. The flayed exterior provided a clear view into the guts. It was like looking inside the belly of a massive, rotting sea creature. Despite the damage, the destroyed ship looked eerily familiar.
He found himself staring at the charred bulkheads instead of focusing on his HUD and the road. Memories flashed through his mind again, blotting out the present.
No, he thought. Not right now …
In the blackened wreck, he saw the apparition of a boy wearing a tin hat. The child waved and smiled at X as he passed. In a room near the bow of the ship, another specter appeared. A woman with electric-blue highlights in her hair stood on a platform.
No … they’re gone. They’re all dead.
X shifted gears and twisted the throttle as far as it would go. The numbers on his HUD ticked up to sixty miles per hour. The tires rumbled over the cracked pavement and started the bike wobbling and threatening to dump. He gripped the handlebars tightly and steadied the bike as they passed the bow of the airship. He kept his eyes on the only thing that mattered: the road. He was almost to the ocean now, and nothing short of a nuclear blast was going to stop him from getting there.
* * * * *
Present day
Jordan lay in bed, listening to the quiet hum of the ship. The bulkheads creaked and groaned all around him. These had always been comforting noises, ever since he was a child. The Hive was the mother and father he had never really had growi
ng up.
He rarely thought of the woman who brought him into this world. She had died long before he was old enough to remember her, and his father hadn’t been around much before he, too, was gone.
Although Jordan didn’t have much guidance in his youth, he had always known he wanted to be captain. He had spent most of his childhood fascinated with the Hive, learning all he could about it: how it stayed in the air, how it supported the people who lived aboard it. In some regards, he was a lot like Michael Everhart. His path had been set for him from an early age.
After Captain Maria Ash passed, Jordan became one of the youngest captains in the history of the Hive. Now, at forty-four, he was determined to make his mark. His years of study and service as second mate to Maria had taught him almost everything he needed to know about how to operate the vessel. It was the only home he had ever known, and he would die to defend it.
The people could curse him; they could talk behind his back; they could riot. It didn’t matter. He would never give up fighting for their future, no matter how much it cost him.
He swung his legs over the side of his bed and put his feet on the cold floor. It still felt odd not having Katrina by his side, but he shook away thoughts of her and their lost child.
Focus. Just keep the ship in the air one more day.
The touch screen across the room warmed to life, displaying the time and temperature at his voice command: 0600 hours / 75 degrees Fahrenheit.
He grabbed his uniform off a hanger in his closet and draped the perfectly ironed shirt and pants over his chair. He dressed quickly, but as he was lacing up his boots, he glanced up and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. A haggard, dispirited face stared back at him. New lines framed his eyes and mouth, and gray streaked through his slicked-back dark hair.
He turned on the sink for two seconds, just enough to fill his palms with cold water. Then he splashed it on his face. There was nothing like it to wake him up in the morning. He looked back up at the mirror, but the bracing dash of water hadn’t changed his appearance.
“You earned the right to serve these people,” he said. “You deserve your command, and you will save them.”
He clipped the sword onto his belt and opened the hatch to his quarters. Del Toro and Lore were waiting for him in the corridor. Neither man looked as though he had slept.
“Do you have a sitrep?” Jordan asked.
“Things calmed down overnight,” Lore said, “thanks to the strong militia presence in every corridor. The curfew seemed to work, too. We made zero arrests.”
“Good. Let’s get going.”
Jordan walked through the passages and admired the recently scrubbed bulkheads and overheads. All the paintings were gone, leaving behind only dark metal and red helium pipes. Seeing the ship cleaned of the images from the past filled him with a refreshing sense of rebirth. He could see the Hive’s skin now, and its veins of helium pipes.
But just as a body needed food, the Hive needed Hell Divers.
The ship was almost in position, and in a few hours they would be dropping the divers over a yellow zone.
Lieutenant Hunt waved at Jordan as he approached the launch bay.
“Stay here,” Jordan ordered his guards.
Lore and Del Toro stood sentry outside the launch bay as Jordan crossed the room, avoiding the gazes of the technicians and divers. He was too tired to talk to anyone but his XO.
Hunt closed the operations booth door behind Jordan. “Good morning, Captain,” he said.
“Is it?” Jordan replied.
The lieutenant shook his head. “No sir. It’s not. We picked up a garbled transmission early this morning. It seems to be an active one, and although I can’t make out any of it, the voice does sound oddly familiar.”
Jordan raised an eyebrow, trying to keep his mind focused on the dive despite the news. “Could it be X? Or is it someone else?”
“It’s not X,” Hunt said. “I’m certain of that. The voice is more youthful.”
“Is it possible Commander Everhart is still alive at the Hilltop Bastion?”
“Maybe, but the transmission is coming from somewhere over Florida.”
Jordan paused to think, then shrugged. He had bigger things to worry about. “Keep me updated.” He turned to head back into the launch bay but stopped when Hunt called him back.
“There’s something else, sir,” Hunt said quietly.
“Great,” Jordan said. “What now?”
“During the raid, the militia found something in the library that you need to see.”
Jordan’s thoughts were interrupted before he could ask any questions. Through the glass window of the operations room, Sergeant Jenkins and several of his men walked into the launch bay. Even at a distance, their faces appeared rough and exhausted from a long night of keeping order on the ship.
Jordan opened the door and stepped out to meet the sergeant. There was fire in Jenkins’ eyes as he marched onto the platform. But he wasn’t focused on the captain.
“Erin, what the hell are you doing?” Jenkins shouted across the room. His angry voice echoed, attracting the attention of all.
Jordan looked to the divers preparing outside their launch tubes. He hadn’t even noticed that Erin was dressed to dive. She carried a helmet in the crook of her arm. An image of a fiery bird was painted on the helmet. For the Hell Divers, Jordan had made an exception to the mandatory art removal, since the emblems were part of the Hive’s history, not reminders of humanity’s existence on the surface. But usually, they chose actual animals that had once existed. He wasn’t sure he approved of such fanciful nonsense.
“I’m going with them, Sergeant,” Erin said. “They are my responsibility.”
Jenkins looked toward him. “We had a deal, Captain. She isn’t supposed to be diving.”
“She clearly made her choice,” Jordan replied. “I had nothing to do with it.”
The technicians and militia in the room went on about their business, while the divers crowded around, along with Hunt, Jordan, and Sergeant Jenkins.
“I’m not a kid anymore,” Erin said. She put a hand on his shoulder and smiled warmly. “I’ll be fine. I’ve done this before.”
“And I made sacrifices so you wouldn’t have to do it again.” He snorted like a bull and looked at Jordan. “She isn’t going. I’ll go instead.”
Jordan shook his head. “I need you on the ship, Sergeant.”
“You don’t even know how to dive,” Erin said.
“Neither do we.”
Jordan looked up at the tall diver they called Giraffe.
“And that’s exactly why I have to do this,” Erin said. “They need me.”
“Personally, I don’t care if she goes or not,” Jordan said, “but figure this out.” He motioned to Hunt to indicate they were leaving. He stopped just short of walking away.
It was his job to wish the divers well, but Jordan hadn’t followed the traditions of the previous captains. Captain Ash would have told them all, “Good luck and Godspeed.” Jordan said, “Oh, and come back with those supplies or don’t come back at all.”
FOURTEEN
Les Mitchells waited in his launch tube, heart pounding in sync with the countdown crackling over the launch bay’s speakers. He should be thinking about the dive. In a few minutes, he was going to be dropping through twenty thousand feet of darkness, into a world he’d never seen before.
A world overrun by mutated monsters, poisonous plants, sinkholes, earthquakes, electrical storms, dust storms, snowstorms, ice storms …
Shut up, Les.
He suppressed the fears racing through his mind and thought about the reason he was doing this: his family. Phyl, Trey, and Katherine were counting on him to come back. He hadn’t even been able to say goodbye to Trey. A kiss on Phyl’s cheek and a squeeze of Katherine’s hand were all h
e could manage.
Captain Jordan wanted the launch to happen, and there was no arguing with the man. But what really rankled Les was that the arrogant bastard hadn’t even wished them good luck. What kind of a captain didn’t even take the time to do something that simple?
A captain that doesn’t give a shit about his people.
Les exhaled his rage and tapped the minicomputer on his left forearm. Normally, he prided himself on being a mostly happy person, but the stress and fear had really gotten under his skin.
The control panel warmed to life, and he activated his HUD. The subscreen in the upper right corner showed five other blips. Jennifer, Ty, Olah, Tom, and Erin were all online.
“Phoenix systems check,” Erin said.
Les finished looking over his data and said, “Phoenix Two online.”
“Phoenix Three online,” Tom said.
“Phoenix Four online,” Olah said.
“Phoenix Five online,” Ty said.
“Phoenix Six online,” Jennifer added.
“Phoenix One, this is command,” came Hunt’s voice. “Skies are clear and ready for dive.”
Les crunched the numbers as he waited. Statistically, one of them was bound to die on Team Phoenix’s debut launch—or at least suffer serious injury, which, for Les, was just as good as being dead. He couldn’t help his family if he couldn’t walk or work.
“In position,” said the lead technician, a man named Harvey. In the past, it would have been Ty at the controls, but now he was in a dive tube.
Les wasn’t happy about Ty diving with them. The former technician had betrayed Captain Jordan and disobeyed orders. That didn’t exactly inspire confidence.
A red light flashed inside the metal cocoon, bathing Les’ long body in a red glow. The first real surge of adrenaline rushed through him as he watched the mission clock on his HUD.
He took in a long breath that smelled of sweat and plastic. The Klaxon screamed, making him flinch. Erin had gone over the launch procedures, but none of it had seemed real.
“Holy shit,” Tom said. “I can’t believe this is happening.”
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