Black Winter

by Kristen Judd

  "We developed a more advanced prototype BioDome that utilizes the principles of the WRS and OGS components from thirty years ago to filtrate oxygen and water molecules from the air through evaporation, sweat, exhaled breath, urine, and carbon dioxide buildup through natural causes. This then is purified and filtrated into clean, breathable oxygen and drinkable water. Nothing goes to waste. Would you like to see it?" Alexa asked.

  "That's enough for now, Alexa," Riggs said. "We don't want to overwhelm our guests. How about you get dinner started?"

  "Of course."

  The floor panels buzzed as Alexa passed digitally through the floorboards. She seemed much more human than computer.

  "She's impressive," Adam said.

  "I like her," Abigail said. She sat Indian-style on the couch with two pillows stuffed under her arms.

  "She's one of our best successes yet," Riggs said. "Just think what we can achieve in the next ten years if we could accomplish all of this in only thirty. There is no limit."

  A guard seemingly stepped out of the wall near the front entryway.

  "Sir," he said. He held an M16 rifle by his side. He eyed the newcomers warily, and then handed a SAT phone to Riggs as he approached. The guard kept his eyes on Adam.

  Riggs handed the satellite phone back to the guard, who definitely walked through the wall this time. Adam watched him disappear.

  "They're ready for us below," Riggs said.

  Adam continued to stare at the wall. "Below?" he said, not taking his eyes off where the guard had been standing. "I thought this was the Dome."

  "This is only the upper level. We haven't even begun to scratch the service. I told you, there is much more than meets the eye. The Dome is more than a black house; it's an entire ecosystem as Alexa said. Even if we pass away, the Dome will run indefinitely on its own. It's the perfect habitat."

  "Dinner will be ready in five minutes," Alexa said, her voice booming from the ceiling.

  Abigail seemed bored with the conversation. "I'm hungry, Daddy."

  Adam was glad to change the subject. He felt overwhelmed with the information. He had never seen anything like the Dome, and he hadn't even seen what was below.

  "Alexa is getting it ready, sweetie. Just a few more minutes, okay?"

  He felt weird saying an inanimate and digital AI was prepping dinner. But as far as he could tell, she was. He had just seen a man walk through a wall, flown several hundred miles to a remote part of Quebec and was standing in what quite possibly could be an underground space station of some sort, capable of lifting out of the ground and propelling them into space in seconds. He felt dizzy and lightheaded, as if his body were levitating.

  Riggs led them to the kitchen where a grand mahogany table with tree trunks as legs was situated near the wall. As they approached, the wall shifted to reveal the outside. The side of the mountain shot skyward as the trees clung to its base and leaned over the Dome. A stream flowed down the edge of the mountain and pooled into a small pond. Abigail immediately jumped for glee and ran to the wall-window. She pressed her hands and face against the now see-through wall and admired the nature.

  Plates lifted out of the table along with a folded napkin and silverware. The food was a whole new experience of its own. Three spheres flew in from around the corner and hovered over each plate and dispensed their contents in neat puddles. Potatoes. Fish. Asparagus and carrots.

  "All made in house." Riggs took his knife and fork and dug in.

  Adam hesitated, shocked at the manner by which his food was delivered, and not only that, but also the freshness and color of the nutrition that sat before him.

  "Abigail, come sit down, darling," he said.

  She sat in the chair beside him, but her eyes were still outside. She took her plate in her lap and forked a bite of the potatoes in her mouth. Adam began with the fish. The flavor erupted the moment it touched his tongue. His saliva glands burst into activity and strangled his mouth in moisture. He quickly took a second and then a third bite. It was the best fish he had ever eaten.

  "Alexa, what did you season this fish with?" he asked. “It’s amazing.”

  "All ingredients are grown and raised in the Dome. We use no artificial flavors or preservatives in our food."

  That wasn't really the answer he was looking for but okay.

  He worked his way to the potatoes, the carrots, and then the asparagus. Each bite seemed to only get better than the last. When he had finished, he wanted more. The other two seemed to be thinking the same thing. Abigail had finished her food well before Adam had, no longer interested in the woods behind her.

  "Is there dessert?" she asked, hopeful.

  As if on cue, the plates sucked into the table and were replaced with a new, smaller one with a bowl on top. The knives and forks were replaced with spoons. The same three spheres spun in and delivered a hot brownie, dripping with caramel and fudge, topped with a dollop of ice cream. The sphere over Abigail squeezed a second dollop onto her plate, inciting a large smile across her face.

  This time, Adam didn't wait for permission to dig in; he quickly scooped up the corner of the brownie and smeared it in the ice cream, caramel, and fudge. The explosion of ecstasy that took place in his mouth was to die for. The more he ate, the more he wanted, and he never felt overstuffed. The food seemed to sit lighter in his stomach. He finished his dessert first and leaned back in his chair. He sighed with contentment and closed his eyes.

  "I could get used to this," he said.

  The sound of a spoon hitting an empty plate rang to his right. Abigail had just finished her mound of ice cream. She had fudge smeared all over her face.

  "That was yummy," she said.

  Riggs completed his dessert as well. The drones removed their dishes moments later. Riggs escorted them away from the kitchen; the wall resumed its blank canvas as they exited.

  "It's late. I'll show you to your rooms, and we'll get started in the morning." Riggs led them around to the other side of the first living room and into a hallway that could have fit a car through it. Two of the four bedrooms were positioned catty corner to the hall. Riggs veered to the left. Stairs led them up into a loft. The last two bedrooms flowed into it from either side.

  "Make yourselves at home. If you need anything, Alexa will assist you. I'll see you in the morning."

  Riggs turned around and walked back down the stairs. Adam stared at his back as he went. What was he supposed to do now? His body answered that for him. Exhaustion finally hit him. His adrenaline had subsided from the initial shock of the Dome, but now his body was working its way back to a balanced state. Abigail even seemed heavy-footed as she collapsed on one of the couches. Adam sat down next to her. She snuggled her head against his chest and he wrapped his arm around her. There were blankets strewn over the back of the couches. He grabbed one and placed it over her. She was snoring in seconds. Adam wasn't far off. He succumbed to the overwhelming call of sleep a few minutes later, unable to resist it any longer.

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  CHAPTER

  - FOUR -

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  Abigail was the first to wake up. Usually Adam would be up well before the rest of the house stirred, but this morning was different.

  Abigail nudged him with her head. "Daddy, it's time to get up."

  He groaned and rotated onto his stomach. He covered his face with the blanket. His body felt like a train had hit it. He jolted when Abigail stood on his back and walked up and down.

  "It's time to get up," she said.

  "All right, I'm up."

  She leapt off the couch, bringing yet another pang of pain in his back. The only time she ever got up before him was Christmas morning. And it definitely wasn't Christmas. He wiped the sleep from his eyes and stretched his back. He must have slept crooked all night. His neck was stiff, and his lower back felt like it had a deep knot in it. Adam walked down the stairs from t
he loft barefoot. When he came around the corner from the hallway, he heard chatter and giggling coming from the kitchen. Riggs and Abigail were both sitting at the table. He had something in his hand.

  "What's going on here?" Adam asked, eyeing Riggs with a questioning stare.

  "He was showing me a KNAT," she said.

  "A what?" Adam looked to Riggs for clarification.

  "KNAT stands for Knowledge Armored Tick," his daughter said with pride. "It's a tiny electronic drone that monitors each room for irregularities and imbalances."

  "Very good. You have a smart young girl, Doctor Richards." Riggs had his arm around her chair. Adam sat next to his daughter.

  "Look, Daddy, Mr. Riggs said I could keep it."

  The KNAT in her hand was definitely small, no bigger than a thumbnail. Its armored shell looked like a beetle, with four small legs coming out the bottom. It scurried back and forth in the palm of her hand.

  She giggled as its metal legs tickled her skin.

  "Are you hungry?" Riggs asked.

  "Famished. I don't know what's gotten into me. My body feels old."

  "It's the elevation. You'll acclimate in a week or two," Riggs said.

  One of the sphere drones came into the room and served Adam a plate full of fresh eggs, bacon, and toast. A glass of orange juice came next. When Adam was finished with his breakfast, Riggs took Adam aside.

  "A report came in late last night. It's not looking good," Riggs said.

  "Did they find out why the volcano erupted? Casualties?"

  "Over a million, and that's just what we're able to estimate from city census records. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) believes it's higher."

  "How much higher?"

  "Three or four million, maybe five. The blast radius is larger than their systems calculate. They aren't sure how that's possible, but there have been some theories."

  "Nuclear?" Adam said more than asked.

  Riggs nodded. "Their lead meteorologists have indicated that the apex of the eruption has reached the highest levels of the atmosphere. They estimate the initial burst released two trillion tons of carbon into the atmosphere. They predict another three to four trillion to follow in the weeks to come."

  "So, what do we do? How do we stop it?"

  "We don't. With this much carbon being released into the atmosphere, greenhouse gases will skyrocket, leading to an increase in the world's average temperature. Instead of 58 degrees Fahrenheit, it'll be more like 80."

  Adam didn't need to be a meteorologist or work for NOAA to understand that wasn't good.

  "What will happen if the average worldwide temperature reaches 80 degrees Fahrenheit?" Adam asked.

  "Bad things. Very bad things," Riggs said. "We need to get started right away."

  Riggs stood in front of the wall where Adam had seen the guard materialize out of thin air and then disappear. As Riggs held out his hand, the wall's material shifted into a million tiny moving parts, as though they were self-controlled ants crawling around in unison. An elevator shaft appeared. Riggs typed in another code on the keypad and the iron gate released its locks. Riggs stepped inside and waited for Adam to join him.

  "Abigail, come on, sweetie."

  His daughter stepped up and looked at the metal framing. "Are we going to the fairy kingdom now?"

  "Yes, we're on our way there now."

  Adam hated lying to his little girl, but it was far better than the alternative. She stepped across the threshold of the ground level Dome and into the chute of the elevator. Riggs latched the iron gate and flicked his wrist over a scan pod inside the shaft. The screen flashed green. Adam noticed the metallic bracelet on his wrist. He took note and stored it into his memory. The elevator shaft jolted as it started its descent.

  "How deep does it go?" Adam asked.

  "Deep enough," Riggs said, sticking to his secretive outlook. At this point, Adam couldn't understand why still all the secrets and hesitancy. Hadn't he already proven that he would do whatever they asked? He’d left his home in Maryland and was now making his way to the center of the earth, all on Riggs' word. Wasn't that enough? And besides, who was there to tell if he decided to go AWOL and expose all the government's top secrets, whatever those were? It wasn't like he could just walk out of here and say, "Hey! Top Secret information over here. Come and get it." He was sealed away in a stone box and now he was on his way to what could end up being his grave. There was nowhere he could run to even if he wanted to. And right about now, he was wondering if he had made the right choice.

  If everything Riggs was saying about the volcano was true, below the ground was probably one of the safest, if not the safest, places to be right now. If not for the severe climate change that was going to take place, but to escape the chaos that the world was about to undergo. Adam didn't know what lay ahead for him and his daughter, but at least they had a chance. His thoughts went to his ex-wife. The last he had spoken with her; she had been worried and panicked. He had assured her everything would be all right. Now he knew better. He hoped they taken his advice and gathered up supplies and hunkered down somewhere safe. Not knowing what was happening on the outside was almost worse than being locked in a tight space a mile below the surface.

  Adam wasn't sure how far down they had gone when the elevator finally came to a halt and Riggs slid the iron gate open, but if he were to guess, he'd say at a minimum, a mile deep. If they were in fact worried about a nuclear strike, they'd need to go to quite a significant depth to avoid radiation leakage and the initial strikes. Adam's ears had a dull aching sensation, just like you get when you're ascending or making your final descent on a plane. They were definitely deep if the pressure had changed. He pinched his nose and blew. The pressure in his ears adjusted marginally.

  "Your ears will adjust to the pressure," Riggs said. "It helps if you drink something or move your jaw."

  Abigail spun her chin in exaggerated circles. She seemed to be less affected by the pressure change he was. The outer protective door of the elevator shaft opened and revealed a pale hallway.

  "After you," Riggs said, as he stepped aside and held the gate open for Adam and his daughter. The two of them stepped foot into an alien world. Other than the rock walls, it looked as though they had merely tunneled through the rock and layered it in industrial materials. Other than the earthy walls, Adam would have thought they were in an office in Langley. Florescent lights hung from the rocky ceiling.

  "This way," Riggs said.

  Adam held his daughter's hand as they headed to the right. She outstretched her left hand and allowed it to scrape over the rock wall as they walked. Riggs' heels clicked on the tile as he led the way. Fifty meters from the elevator, the hall opened up into a circular atrium. The ceiling rose slightly more than the hall, but it still had that claustrophobic feeling about it. Fortunately, Adam wasn't claustrophobic. But even he was feeling a bit antsy from the tight walls and the knowledge that he was under several million tons of compact dirt and rock. If the ceiling or walls collapsed and caved in, they were goners. And with no one on the outside knowing of its existence or their whereabouts, there would be no hope of escape and rescue. That only added to Adam's growing anxiety and unease. Riggs still hadn't told him why he was here or what they wanted from him. Everything had been cast in a cloak and dagger kind of theme, no one revealing more than was necessary, and that was minimal.

  "Please wait here," Riggs said.

  He walked down one of the five intersecting hallways that filtered into the one atrium. Abigail sat while Adam stood. There were spheres all across the ceiling and at every hallway entrance. He assumed they were cameras. He thought it was a little excessive, but hey, wasn't that how the government always did things? Go big or go home. You could never have too much security and surveillance, even when you're miles underground and the world all around you is going up in flames.

  There were gray sofas in the circular atrium that looked like something that belonged on the Intern
ational Space Station (ISS). Maybe the government had reprocessed them when the ISS was retired and replaced by the Global Space Circuit (GSC) stations that were constructed to journey outside of Earth's orbit. As resources gradually depleted and new sources were found in deep space, the United Nations, led by the United States, proposed a joint effort by all countries to build a new station, one that could go beyond where we had seen.

  At the time, it sounded too much like science fiction to most of the world leaders, but as the years progressed and supplies dwindled even more, and the population continued to grow exponentially, one by one they came onboard. The joint program was known as the M.A.R.S. Initiative. The first Global Space Circuit, GSC Titan, was fully operational in 2035 and remained in Earth's orbit. Within a decade, there were two more. GSC Alpha and GSC Omega. Alpha replaced Titan with more advanced systems and was assigned as the permanent orbital station for Earth. Titan became a cargo bay for new shipments and supplies sent to space. It also acted as a temporary living station for astronauts, engineers, scientists, and the maintenance crews.

  Omega was a smaller version of its sister at nearly a third the size and altered to support space travel. It now orbited Mars while NASA attempted to terraform the red planet. Significant progress had been made, but no decisive ventures had been made to send humans there to begin colonizing. The crew on the GSC Omega was alone—for now. Adam wondered if now the leaders that be would finally decide to send humans to Mars. The Global Space Circuits weren't constructed for permanent living and could only house approximately 50,000 occupants, if they removed the Gravity Propulsion System (GPS) and retrofitted some of the cargo bays into living quarters. Even then, it would be temporary. The life support and oxygen supply, not to mention the food supply, would quickly taper away. It would only be a matter of time before the occupants onboard would need to return to Earth or think of another solution to the shortage. And if Earth was no longer habitable, Adam knew what would happen. Survival of the fittest.