Genesis Again

by Brian Dae

  ‘We were not inside the blast range. Operational Logistics instructed us to evacuate our position and retreat from the battlefield.”

  “Why did you not fall back East as ordered?”

  “We did not have enough gas in our truck to cross the distance. I decided to bring the soldiers under my command across the mountains to take shelter from the fallout.”

  “Where is your Commanding Officer?”

  ‘Captain Stone accompanied a different unit East while the remaining soldiers followed me south due to our limited gas supplies. I am the acting commander for my unit.”

  “Hop into the back, we’ll sort out everything in Estessia Lieutenant.”

  Sitting in the back, the soldiers spread their legs and slumped on the truck bed. Grueling travel weighed heavily on their legs and they were happy to see an end to their war. Cassidy knew it was not over for him. Even after reaching Estessia, he would likely have to accompany any rescue effort looking for the missing men, even if he only did it as an obligation. For now he rested his head and sighed. He would need to go back again.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The plane rocked with mild turbulence. Cassidy found himself slouching forward with his teeth clenched and his lower back sat at an acute angle, feet bumping against the seat legs of the preceding row. Back when soldiers received military leave, they returned home on planes laid out like unsecured cargo shifting around midflight, causing them to arrive damaged and disorientated. Having regular seats on the plane came as a welcome improvement over its bare predecessor while elsewhere comfort remained abysmal. Without windows and decent lighting inside the cabin, lit by bare red bulbs alone, anxiety festered. Terrified of not knowing where they were headed and how long they had been flying over a warzone. His nails sank into the polyester seat and drew up lint on his gloves.

  Altogether his unit consisted of ten men: eight veterans outside their primes and two rangers very much in theirs. From the original 21-man roster called to serve in this mission, eight failed to pass a physical check-up and five faced discharge for various offenses—falling short of the twelve recommended by the mission planner. General Adder figured they could manage and signed off on the dispatch. Military analysts predicted safe entry and extraction; a low-risk operation with an acceptable margin for human error. They even recommended that the soldiers bring limited weaponry to pare excess weight, explaining how their large roomy suits encumbered movement enough to make them easy targets in the event of a firefight. Any munitions served to protect against wildlife not enemy combatants. More importantly, the analysts stressed safe movement, warning them to avoid errant metal shards jettisoning out from the rubble. Any tear on their suits would leave them as exposed as standing bare on the moon.

  Pilots often joked over the intercoms to calm nerves. Soldiers found the practice polarizing with some demanding total silence while others preferred levity to distract themselves from doing something they would rather not do. Being a mission under the highest classification, silence prevailed. Absent pilot interference, the veterans could not summon a word between them, unsure of themselves. None of them knew how the other operated in the field or where they belonged in the machinery as they all came from separate units. Under no reasonable assessment would a unit be pulled together from this lot without some ulterior motive—a shared thought no one spoke aloud. Save for the two rangers they were civilians being told to conduct a military operation. Nominally serving as leader he knew his role was simply to wear a badge while the rangers did all the work. Thinking of the mission now made him want to retch. At this point everything rode on instinct and emotion.

  Shifting their legs, the two rangers turned to face the door and clipped their tags to the rack. Cassidy saw them check their watches in the corner of his eye every so often and now it must have been near time to jump. The sound of fabric rustling meant others picked up on it too. Quickened heartbeats followed. Anticipation seen in faces watching the rangers. After flying west they would drop-off and drift downward, land, and move in a singular direction: east. Simple enough. Anywhere further west or south and they would be headed toward the fighting. Hearing the general describe their mission made it sound easy; tricking themselves into believing it could be so was much more difficult. Army commands always reduced things so the common denominator could understand: take this hill, push through, fall back. Fly, land, move east, search, and return. If you still struggled with comprehension at this point, you could just copy what everyone else did and follow along. Things needed to be simple in the confusion and chaos.

  Wordlessly the sitting veterans rose and situated themselves behind the rangers, chests nearly touching each other’s backs and helmets butting with turbulence. Feet in oversized boots wobbling about. Normally he would look at his team members’ faces to help him understand the overall mood but he failed to see anything hidden behind their glass masks, only recognizing them by the bright orange numbers stitched into the suits. Ahead stood numbers four, seven, and three, placing him fourth in jumping order after the ranger. Number three scrunched himself so tightly that a hand placed on his shoulder might cause him to seize. If Cassidy remembered correctly, this number belonged to a veteran named Timothy—a school administrator who worked for a district down south where all their kids together might fit inside a single auditorium. Fear of heights posed an instinctual barrier in jumping but his hesitance might arise from experience. As middle-aged men they possessed the hindsight to imagine their leaders as idiots, ordinary men who would confidently lead them into horrible circumstances if given the order. For skeptics holding much to lose jumping out of the plane made no sense. There was no reason to call such a man back to serve with faithful young soldiers like the rangers.

  The light flashed green. Everyone turned their heads to look at the change in color. Over in front the ranger pulled the latch open letting cold winds whistle past, raising the door above his head.

  “Ready now! Ten seconds to jump! Latch your clips! Now go!”

  He jumped out the door and everyone followed after. Twelve men descending in all. Cassidy could see what it looked like outside for the first time. It was hell. A scorched earth. Among the outlines of city streets and ruined structures lay an immeasurable quantity of debris, millions of twisted articles becoming the sand grains that littered a desolate beach—what remained of the largest city on their continent and a former great power. As they fell toward Vieten, the collective souls of its former inhabitants raised their hands in a wave of air to repel them back, rejecting these intruders with furious winds. In near unison the men released their parachutes and started to drift down slowly, regaining their composure in finding a soft descent. It was just past dawn judging by the sunlight and they could see the plane flying away overhead; the metallic bird appearing almost motionless against the sky. Everyone could feel the draft pushing up against their suits but without any exposed skin it was like sinking in sand and no one wanted to look down at what enveloped them.

  The rangers drifted past ground zero. There a large pit contrasted itself with the flattened rubble surrounding it in all directions away from the city center. One imagined the rocket failed to go far before detonation. Being used to pictures of a thriving city made it impossible for the veterans to judge their directions based on familiar landmarks and this memory distressed them, finding it difficult to reconcile knowledge of what existed before with the emptiness replacing it. Magnificent churches interspersed between old regal estates once peered above the red tiled roofs of Vieten in stark contrast to the short histories of Vandia’s buildings, where nothing built could be determined older than anything once standing in the Old City. Only purpose-built facilities like the research center could be mistaken for modern and they all sat beyond the traditional city limits in the west. Even then its reinforced steel beams now laid deformed in the shape of a blooming flower—everything else erased in the near vicinity. One by one they started to land on the cracked road running adjacent to the research ce
nter, hitting the ground and ripping off their parachutes.

  Radiation contaminated the dust around them. It made them smell an illusory odor of burnt metal. If they had been able to smell anything at all, it would mean the particles were inside their suits, causing them to decay and die in short measure or after a reasonable amount of pained suffering. To be afraid of the very earth they stood on impressed an unearthly discomfort in them. If not for the switch underneath their fingertips they would lack the ability to communicate their thoughts and observations of the land around them and if not for the speakers sitting on their cheeks no one would hear the heavy breathing of the out-of-shape men. Before adulthood this grassy knoll would have been a pleasant place to take a hike and explore, fed by life-giving streams flowing west to the ocean. Underneath large white clouds Cassidy could almost pretend it carried the same old charm. War always changed the land it was fought over but a somber finality accompanied the resurgent strains of life emerging from this wasteland. Nothing grew taller than their knees.

  Traversing over piled-up rubble posed the risk of scratching their suits over jagged rock or stray bits of metallic wire strewn about the facility floor. Cassidy made sure to take measured steps atop large slabs of collapsed ceiling. His gray suit could camouflage the dust clinging to his body but it was still noticeable on his pitch black boots kicking up the detritus. A scene not too different from construction workers preparing a building for demolition. Compared to what they saw flying overhead the research center managed to survive the explosion relatively well, maintaining most of its vaulted ceiling in the reception save for some open spaces where the sun shined through. Crumbling stairs protruded behind where the receptionists would have sat and lead to an exposed second level, glass railing now torn off its side to become truly transparent. From top to bottom they could see twelve separate doors. Strained by choice the veterans huddled together below and allowed themselves to be counted under the lead ranger’s breath. Ranger Mathews seemed knowledgeable enough about the floorplan to lead them in the rightmost direction. Flooding air may have stripped paint off the walls and lodged furniture against it but one could still make out the general floorplan. All the veterans needed to do while he guided them was to keep an eye out for something resembling the so-called Radio-isotype B512. With barely anything cluttering the hallways the job remained easy for a stretch as they descended deeper into the building, passing by cleared out offices. As they drew closer to the center something eventually caught the ranger’s attention.

  Bolted into the ground lay an enormous metal door with eight formidable locks keeping it sealed shut. Under the threat of aerial bombings an air shelter made practical sense, especially for high value targets such as these where an entire scientific division could be eliminated in a daytime raid. As for security against intruders, whoever last closed the door behind them felt no need to keep it locked. Four veterans assisted in lifting the heavy door by leveraging it open with rocks and then pushing it from a crouched position, turning the massive hinges onto its base. Perhaps a single healthy man might have sufficed but gaining a grip let alone exerting a force through their gloves proved more challenging than anticipated, spending a good ten minutes on this simple operation. Nonetheless it brought a curious satisfaction in moving this sheet metal slab to expose what rested below with onlookers hanging around the edge. Blackness. Lights stopped working twenty-three years ago and only the top most stairs could be seen with what little light came through the window. Descending literally into the unknown. If anybody survived during this time they would likely have been endangered by opening the door and letting the radioactive fallout contaminate the area.

  Mathews’ deputy, Ranger Johnson flashed his light and dropped in with his hand stretched out to maintain balance. Once he and his light faded from sight, they heard his voice on the radio giving the go-ahead to advance on. Paired in twos the veterans descended putting their hands against the walls; the corridor spanning approximately 2 meters across and 2 meters tall. Missing the final step and nearly tripping over it caught Cassidy off-balance, fortunately skidding ahead on level ground. Once he lifted his head he could see light emerge from around another thick metal door which previous pairs entered one-by-one. Past the door it looked as if the ruined offices from above duplicated themselves below with exceedingly good if not pristine condition, preserving a still image of the period. A few shelves looked rocked out of place by the subsequent shockwaves but for the most part he could place everything to their original positions and rearrange them if he so wished. Disturbed by a small earthquake at worst.

  Further ahead the rangers kept flicking on switches. Somewhere a hidden generator powered on room after room, illuminating their search with dusty orange light. Limited decoration adorned the office space but unlike before, they could find some scattered documentation littered about on the table, sorted through in a hurry by the prior inhabitants. Whatever those individuals considered valuable had been destroyed or removed long ago. Limited Karkovian made it impossible for the veterans to discern the difference. Just an inkling when looking at the burned remains of paper shards lining the edges of the sink, illegible inked letters matted against the sides. Deeper in, the rooms became decidedly more residential, providing basic lodging and accommodations for what might have been long sieges. Ransacking cabinets made them feel like vagabonds sorting through someone else’s belongings as they drew up wrinkled clothing and loose trash. Still, their main objective was to look for a gleaming bar of metal, a vague item, and any documents which might be of scientific importance. Why would the previous inhabitants not take these things along with them if everything else had been stripped? As they progressed on it increasingly became obvious their expectations were correct.

  Then the hanger appeared. Wide enough to house full-sized airplanes, large mechanical devices crowded the floor along with their accompanying equipment—stainless steel apparatuses that evoked images of science fiction with their colorful diodes and fantastical shapes. Located at the center stood hundreds of metal cylinders standing upright with various pipes connecting them to measuring tools which would have been managed by engineers standing on a higher platform. Enrichment and material processing continued onto segmented operations down the line, eventually ending with a final product transported through metal doors even larger than the one they encountered earlier. Speaking to the sensitivity of the material produced here, massive air vents ran atop the ceiling that would have suctioned out free particles floating about the air and windmill sized fans pressed new air through large blocky filters, able to replace the room’s volume in a matter of minutes. Now shuttered and inactive. Their fallout covered bodies would be the first time this clean space was contaminated since its last operation.

  Having exhibited great interest, the rangers strolled alongside the veterans in examining their surroundings and took pictures of the inventory with small cameras seated behind their glass helmets. If these structures were built at such scale, Cassidy began to imagine that Radio-isotope B512 might actually exist as a physical object they could find rather than a pointless mission searching for imaginary ideas. Suspicions still prevailed toward the mission but he felt more inclined to search deeper into the piles of burnt detritus piled up in the corners. Crouching down with a veteran who read basic Karkovian yielded little however as not much could be gleamed from single words or scientific phrases without context and what remained were mostly daily reports dealing with procurement and staff shortages due to the war. Progressing throughout the factory led them to a final gate where the trucks must have brought in all the equipment. It had been sealed shut with metal barricades but the wall around it seemed to crack under pressure or perhaps simply lack of maintenance. Unsatisfied with what they collected thus far, the rangers circled back and started inspecting the side rooms for more information, opening a door to what looked to be an office better suited to experimentation and sensitive material. As reasonably educated men, they could interpret the scie
ntific instruments within as belonging to a certain process but not exactly what it looked for or measured. Without any notes left behind it was only guesswork anyway. Just microscopes, flasks, odd assembled machines, and chalkboards where academics might hypothesize on the outcomes. To the side they saw a thin metal door looking at odds with its surrounding. Pulling it aside revealed a collapsed tunnel going in multiple directions. During the later years it likely served to move things around without being spotted.

  In the opposite direction a group of veterans found private offices tucked away at the farthest end of the factory. Calling everyone over, the discoverers tossed around interesting knick-knacks between themselves while people started filing in, contemplating whether to bring these items home as souvenirs if not for the radiation: golden plaques, glass shapes, lacquered pens, and empty picture frames. Like children distracted by colorful trinkets the toys traded hands in a circle. The rangers pocketed some of the booklets inside their silver-colored bags but even beneath their masked faces, Cassidy could tell the mission so far had been disappointing. Most of the machinery inside the facility would presumably be outdated by now given the twenty years that passed and Vandia always possessed the more advanced program to begin with. Sending in more exploratory forces to gleam what little they could from the machines would prove less fruitful than scanning over a couple pictures and basing things on conjecture. Maybe the impossibility of their mission rested in seeking to return with something worthwhile in a practical sense when they should be treating the purpose as one rested in historical curiosity. Cassidy returned to his suspicions that the entire operation was pointless. An almost fevered idea to overturn one last stone before heading home from the war.

  While Cassidy stewed in his own discontent a group of veterans started banging on a pair of large doors next door. Subtracting the office space and judging by the length of the wall, this sealed off space likely served as either barracks or a storeroom fit to hold an entire office’s rations. Instead of resorting to brute force to pry it open a ranger studied the lock and simply turned it the other way. Whoever closed the door did not bother to lock it as well. Unlike the other rooms from before this time the lights were already on when the door peeled back. This sudden release of light caused the veterans to fall back against the wall while the other ranger raised his pistol, eyes shooting off each other in knowing anticipation. Assaulting the room in his bulky suit, the pistol-equipped ranger rushed in alone and was heard thrashing about, overturning what sounded to be fully stocked shelves to duck and cover. After a short pause he told them to enter.