by Chris Angus
“Give it time,” Logan said quietly. “We’ve plenty to keep us busy just trying to survive. Maybe in time we’ll discover others.”
Suddenly, Yä Ling came bursting into the room. Her eyes had a wild look in them. “Gaoming needs help, Logan—quickly.”
“What is it?” He was on his feet in an instant.
“The oval . . . it’s moving!”
CHAPTER THIRTY
The White House
THE FIRST LADY died during the early morning hours. They removed her body to one of the large, walk-in coolers in the kitchens and managed to restart one of the generators and hook it up to the cooler. It was only a temporary solution, but no one was thinking about tomorrow any more. Then they all retreated to the Oval Office to get drunk on a bottle of thirty-year-old scotch the prime minister of Canada had given the president two years earlier.
The liquor didn’t sit well with Littlefield, who was beginning to show signs of the disease. He had a fever and headache, and felt light-headed. For the past twenty-four hours, his ability to concentrate and speak rationally had deteriorated to the point where he could now only ramble incoherently. Gordon actually thought he was making more sense than usual.
The president’s last aide was also gone. He’d never returned from his foray to the East Wing to check on the explosion they’d heard. They searched for him, but the man had simply vanished. There was also no sign of any damage. The blast could have been anything, from a broken gas main to fuel tanks from a burning gas station. Fires could be seen all over the city. They burned out of control, for there were no firemen or anyone else to fight the conflagrations.
It hardly mattered. The city was all but empty. Neither the satellite communications system nor a battery-powered amateur ham radio Gordon had in his office was able to raise anyone at all. Gordon said it was the first time he’d ever used the ham radio and found nothing but static the entire length of the dial.
“They’re all dead,” said Klein morosely, draining his glass and refilling it again. “Everyone in the country—maybe everyone in the world.”
“If that’s true,” said Gordon, “it’s pretty incredible to think that three people in the White House may be the last to die. I’d say that’s a bit of poetic justice, the most powerful man in the world being forced to watch the demise of the human race to the bitter end. Wouldn’t you agree, Paul?”
But Littlefield was too sick to respond. His deterioration had increased rapidly since the conversation with Marcia. It was almost as if his will to live had been drained from him, like water from a swamp. As it became ever clearer that the reign of mankind was coming to an end, Littlefield, perhaps mercifully, was unable to process the information. His world view had been proved utterly wrong. There was no longer any question as to whether man was at the center of the universe. Soon, mankind would cease to occupy even the smallest corner of the grand scheme of creation.
“I wonder . . .” said the president.
Gordon looked up blankly. “What?”
“I just wonder . . . if man will ever rise again.”
“Are you serious?”
“From what I understand, DNA will go on. All the codes and genetic information that made us will continue to exist. Why couldn’t it happen?”
Gordon just shook his head. “It would take billions of years and all the natural mutations would have to fall in precisely the same way. No. Some other intelligence may rise someday. But it could just as easily look like a tree toad as a human. I’m afraid our day is over.”
The president sighed. “Just as well, I suppose. We’d probably only get another visitation from that damned oval.” He looked at Littlefield, whose head had rolled over onto his shoulders. The man might have been dead, if they hadn’t been able to see his chest rising and falling. “Lucky bastard! What I’d give for that sort of oblivion about now.”
Gordon suddenly felt nauseous and went into a severe coughing fit that lasted for several minutes. When it was over, he was much weaker and realized that he, too, was probably entering the increasingly rapid final stages of the sickness.
No longer concerned about his own fate, Klein sat beside his old friend, helping him to take a drink of water. Then he poured himself the last of the scotch, stood up and went over to the window. He raised his glass to the Washington Monument, hesitated a moment, then said quietly, “Hell of a way to end a presidency.”
He swallowed the scotch in a single gulp.
Keene Valley
Elwood heard them coming a long way off. A lifetime of living in the woods had honed his hearing to an extraordinary level. There was no telling how the people had found them up here in the middle of nowhere. Maybe someone had seen him return from town or possibly one of the mad souls below had caught the glint of reflection from something at the camp.
But he knew the moment he heard voices that these people were not sick. Somehow they had escaped the epidemic.
He was sitting at the maple tree when he heard the grunts of effort as the men pulled themselves up the steep climb. Quickly, he went down far enough to get a glimpse of them. There were half a dozen men, armed with rifles. He could hear them talking about the cabin. Somehow, they knew where it was and intended to take it for themselves. With force if necessary.
They were out of shape and moving slowly. He estimated it would take half an hour for them to reach the cabin. He hurried back to tell the others.
To their great relief, Amelia had begun to get better in the last few days. She still wasn’t one hundred percent, but it was clear she didn’t have the sickness—only another persistent bug. That the men headed toward them were also healthy suggested at least a few people had some sort of immunity to the disease.
Alford wanted to go out and speak to them.
“Why not, Elwood? There’s safety in numbers. If they have guns, they could help us fight off any of the sick who might locate us here. If those men could find us, maybe others can, too.”
“There’s no tellin’ how they heard of this place,” Elwood said. “Maybe it’s someone from the village who heard ’bout me, but I can tell you after seein’ the sorta things that went on down in that town, we don’t want them findin’ us unprepared. They’ll want our supplies, our home, and even . . .” he stared at Alford hard, “the women.”
“The women?” said Alford. “But Amelia’s only a girl.”
“She’s twelve, Alford, and she’s a pretty little thing. I shouldn’t gotta spell it out for you. And then there’s Sarah . . . you understand what I’m sayin’?”
The message sank in hard, but Alford got it.
“What can we do?” he asked. “We’ve only got your rifle and my pistol against six armed men.”
“First thing—we’re leavin’ the cabin. We’d only be trapped here. Sarah, I want you to take Amelia back into the woods. Go to that little clearing where you pick berries. It’s a hard place to find and you’ll be okay until we come for you.”
Sarah gripped his arm. “What if you don’t come?” she asked.
“We’ll come. Nobody knows these woods better than I do. You gotta trust me.”
Alford hugged Sarah tightly, then he lifted Amelia up and kissed her. He stroked her fair hair for a moment, his heart full of pain. Once they were gone, that pain turned to determination. He’d do whatever it took to protect them. Thank God he had Elwood. The old guide might be eighty-two, but he was the fittest eighty-two-year-old those men below would ever confront.
“Okay, listen,” said Elwood. “They’re gonna be at their most vulnerable when they get to the cabin. They’ll think we’re holed up inside someways and maybe try to trick us into comin’ out.” He led the way around the side of the cabin, got down on all fours and began to pull traps out from underneath a pile of old boards.
“Where’d you get those?” asked Alford. “I thought you didn’t trap.”
“I don’t. These here traps I took from all over the woods. Some are thirty years old if they’re a day, but n
ot much to a leg-hold trap. They’ll still work. Here,” he handed half a dozen of the ugly-looking things to Alford. “You set them and hand them to me. Hurry up. We can’t have more than ten or fifteen minutes.”
Elwood placed traps inside the cabin under each window and just inside the front door. Then he put more traps in the grass and brush approaches to the cabin on all sides, taking as much care as he felt he had time for to cover them so they wouldn’t be visible. When he was finished, he grasped Alford’s arm and pointed to the ledge behind the cabin.
“You got a good field of vision up there and it won’t be too long a shot for your pistol.”
“Where are you going?”
“I’ll be back in the woods in the direction they’re comin’ in from. I know how to hide so’s they won’t see me as they approach. Let ’em come in and give ’em time to find the traps before you shoot.” He looked steadily at his friend. “We’re not playin’ games here, Alford. It’s us or them. We need to get ’em all. If even one gets away, he’ll be back with a new bunch. This place is a haven in a world gone mad. Nothin’ will stop people from seekin’ it out. Our only protection is that no one knows we’re here. Once the shootin’ starts, don’t let up till they’re all dead. If you gotta problem with that, just think about Amelia and what might happen if you hesitate.”
“I won’t hesitate,” said Alford, and Elwood believed him.
Then Elwood melted into the forest in front of the cabin. He went about twenty feet and found a dead tree covered with moss that backed against a large boulder. He crawled in between tree and boulder and pulled a mat of moss over him. He was completely invisible, just six inches of his rifle barrel sticking out, looking like a stick or a broken branch. He’d have a clear field of vision to the cabin once the men passed him by.
It was almost like one of the games he played as a child, imagining Indians all around. He’d done this a hundred times, lying under a moss blanket pretending his parents’ lives were in his hands as the hostiles approached. He couldn’t believe how alive he felt. Then he heard them coming and remembered what was at stake. This was no game.
The six came in slowly, rifles ready. They were filthy from the climb and clearly tired. That would be to their disadvantage.
But incredibly, all of the men somehow escaped the traps Elwood had placed on the approaches. It was pure dumb luck on their part. He saw a couple of them miss traps by no more than an inch or two.
They crouched just inside the forest line and spoke in soft voices, planning their attack. Two of the men argued briefly over how to proceed. One wanted to go in guns blazing. The other suggested they call out first, maybe catch the people inside off guard and shoot them as they came out.
The second man won out. He stood up, put his gun down and walked into the clearing empty-handed.
“Hello? Hello in the cabin? Anyone home?”
He edged toward the doorway, eyes darting all around. He was obviously plenty scared.
Then Elwood swore as he heard Alford’s voice. His friend was still on the ledge behind the house, but when he spoke, it sounded like someone who was inside.
“What do you want?” he asked.
The man in front almost jumped out of his skin.
“We—we’re looking for the old guide who lived here. Wanted to see if he was okay,” the man said.
Elwood almost smiled. The first good Samaritans to come up here looking for him in all his eighty years. Rangers came sometimes to chat, but they never worried about Elwood.
“Well,” said Alford, his voice muffled, “come on in then.”
The man looked back at his friends and nodded. All but two moved forward. These two began to reposition themselves in the woods in preparation to offer cover fire if necessary. Elwood moved his rifle barrel ever so slightly in their direction.
Once the four men were in front of the house, the first man moved to the door and grasped the handle. Before he turned it, he directed one man to each window at the front and then did a silent count.
All three moved at the same moment. Two went headfirst through the windows while the first pushed the door open and went in fast.
There followed a series of snaps and screams that reverberated through the woods. The remaining man in front ducked into a crouch at the sounds and barely had time to raise his gun before Alford shot him square in the chest with his pistol.
At that, Elwood shot one of the two remaining men in the woods. The last man bolted after seeing all of his companions put out of commission. Elwood turned and followed him with his rifle. He fired just as the poor fellow stepped into another trap. The bullet cut off his scream before it could leave his mouth.
When he looked back at the cabin, Elwood saw Alford standing in the doorway. There were two quick shots and the screams, which had turned to moans, ceased entirely.
It was all over in less than a minute. Six men dead.
Elwood emerged from his mossy hiding place and went over to Alford. His friend was shaking, the pistol hanging limply at his side. Carefully, Elwood eased the gun from his fingers. Then he looked in the cabin.
It was a gruesome sight. One of the men had hit the trap with his head, which had been crushed like an eggshell. He hadn’t been one of the screamers. His pain was over before it had begun. The other two had their feet ensnared.
Elwood put his rifle down, went around the side of the cabin to his woodshed, and came back with two shovels. “We got work to do before we bring the girls back. You did real good, Alford.”
Alford could only nod. Then he turned away and vomited. A moment later, he reached for one of the shovels and went to work. It took two hours for them to dig a hole large enough to accommodate all the men. They made the hole fifty yards from the cabin in a thick brushy area they rarely ventured into, so Amelia wouldn’t have to see it.
When they were finished, they hauled the men to their final resting place, then went to find Sarah and Amelia.
Elwood hoped they hadn’t somehow been further exposed by the seemingly healthy men. Not that there was anything they could do about it. The main thing, he thought, as he picked up Amelia and hugged the little girl tightly, was that they were safe again.
She smiled at him with bright eyes that showed no sign of any sickness. They held nothing but love.
Logan hurried after Yä Ling with the others all close in tow behind. She headed straight across the courtyard and up the steps to Xuemin’s private room. They burst in to find Gaoming and the old monk standing in front of the desk where the oval had rested. Only the oval was no longer on the desk. It now hovered in the air, rotating slowly, like a football that had been given the perfect spin by an expert passer.
As everyone gathered around staring at the incredible sight, they became aware that the room was colder than normal. In fact, it was close to freezing, despite the roaring fire in the fireplace.
Marcia looked at Xuemin. During their work, she’d begun to suspect something of this nature might come to pass. “It’s building up its power,” she said, matter-of-factly.
The old man said nothing. Indeed, he seemed fixated by the rotating oval, his mouth open, lips moving silently.
“What the hell are you talking about?” asked Logan.
“Like charging the battery in your car or fueling the rocket boosters for the space shuttle,” said Marcia. “In preparation for departure.”
“Departure? For where?”
She shrugged. “We’ve interpreted enough to suspect there may be other destinations represented by the symbols, just as our solar system was. Xuemin and I discussed this as one possible scenario.”
“I don’t understand,” said Alan. “What scenario?”
“It’s simple enough. The oval has finished its job here, and is preparing for its next assignment.”
“What assignment?” asked Logan, though he had a pretty good idea what Marcia had in mind.
“The next civilization—or intelligence—to be wiped out.” She stared at the
floating oval and shivered in the increasingly cold room. “We ought to stop it.”
“But—isn’t it actually spreading life?” asked Alan. “By delivering the gift of DNA across the universe?”
“Perhaps,” said Marcia. “Just not intelligent life. Look at it this way. The oval is a kind of religion unto itself. And what do all religions do? First they give the gift of life. But because we’re mortal, they inevitably take it away again . . . or worse . . . condemn us to eternal damnation. To the creators of the oval, the greatest evil is not a lack of faith, but simply intelligence itself. Just as religion punishes those without faith, so our device here punishes the rise of intelligence. It giveth life and it taketh it away.”
“But I understood you to say,” said Diana, “that the aliens might well be immortal themselves. If that’s the case, then why are they bothering to spread DNA across the universe?”
“A good question,” said Marcia. “Remember, we don’t know for certain if the spread of DNA is the oval’s actual purpose. Maybe it’s simply seeking out DNA in order to infect it with the new sequence, which is programmed to end intelligence. But let’s say spreading DNA is the purpose—one possible explanation might be that they are driven to spread the evidence of their own being and superiority, not unlike how Littlefield was driven to spread his religious doctrine. The universe is without end. Even the creators of the oval can’t possibly know it all. Perhaps they’re also driven to search for any possible threat to their own self-image as, essentially, gods.”
“Pretty damn insecure gods, if you ask me,” said Leeanne.
“Yes, they are. I think at the bottom of it all is their intolerance, an inability to accept that they aren’t perfect and right in all things. Again, not unlike Paul Littlefield. And there’s something else,” said Marcia.
Everyone looked at her, the slowly rotating oval forgotten for the moment.
“They’re not only intolerant, but they’re also profoundly conflicted. They spread life as a form of self-affirmation, but they fear it at the same time, that some other intelligence might surpass them. Call them gods if you will, but I would suggest they are very imperfect beings. Frankly, they’re a lot like us, a further sign that we may be their children.”