Freedom's Last Gasp

by M. A. Rothman

  The agent chuckled as his fingers clacked on the keyboard. “You won’t even sense it. The memories are simply being built within your neural cortex. Think about it this way. You know how to ride a bicycle?”

  “Of course.”

  “I assumed so. But right now, are you thinking of all those memories and skills? Of course not. They’re there if you need them, but when you don’t need them, you’re unaware of them. And even when you do ride a bike, the learned information is recalled without you having to actively think about it. These new memories will be no different.”

  The agent hit one more key. “There we go. This will take about forty-five minutes.”

  As the chair hummed even louder, and a cooling fan kicked in, Priya took a deep breath and tried to dismiss the voice in her head telling her this was a huge mistake.

  “I don’t need this crap,” Priya grumbled at the underground tube station’s control panel. She again placed her hand on the panel, and again the computerized voice with the New York accent said, “This control panel is for the use of personnel with Section Z8 or higher access level.”

  “To hell with you,” Priya said.

  It had been almost half an hour since Agent Ted had escorted her to the tube station from “the dungeon,” and she’d been waiting for Jenkins to arrive ever since. She was literally trapped here without him, and her sore arm and growing headache didn’t help her mood one bit.

  Finally, the familiar sound of rushing air came from behind the metal doors to the tube, though there was no announcement of the incoming car nor any of the normal advisories. The doors slid open and Colonel Jenkins stepped out, once more in his military uniform. The doors slammed shut behind him the second he was on the platform, as if to prevent anyone jumping aboard.

  “I hope you weren’t waiting too long. Ready to head home?”

  Priya frowned at his matter-of-fact manner, but she breathed away the snippy reply she was tempted to give. “Yes. Can you get just me to the Coral Springs, North Junction station? I’m exhausted.”

  “Of course.”

  The control panel graciously recognized Colonel Jenkins, of course, and within seconds, it had queued a request for a transport to Priya’s home station. Priya just wanted to go home. This place gave her the creeps. Agent Ted doubly so.

  “Are you okay?” Jenkins asked, giving her a look of concern.

  “I’m fine.” Priya didn’t want to talk about it. It wasn’t fair that he’d dumped all this on her. And the more she was learning about the mission, the worse she felt about everything and everyone around her.

  “Link complete. The car is arriving in three… two… one…”

  The doors to the tube slid open, and Jenkins motioned toward the capsule. “I’ll catch the next one,” he said, smiling.

  Moments later, Priya felt herself pushed against the seat as her ride accelerated toward home.

  Chapter Four

  “General Duhrer’s office, this is Valerie. Can I help you?”

  The colonel leaned forward, resting his elbows on his desk. “Valerie, this is Colonel Gary Jenkins, head of—”

  “I’m sorry, Colonel, I received your e-mail, but the general doesn’t have any time on his calendar. If you have specific questions, please e-mail them and I’ll make sure he’s made aware of your request. Is there anything else? I have two other people waiting on the line.”

  “No,” the colonel growled.

  The line went dead.

  “Damn, isn’t she just a barrel of sunshine?” said Todd Winslow, sitting on the opposite side of the desk. “A full bird colonel and she blows you off,” he snapped his fingers, “just like that.”

  Jenkins sighed and ignored the comment. With a swipe of his fingers, a holographic image appeared above his desk. “This is her,” he said. “The Radcliffe girl.”

  “She looks nice enough,” Todd said. “Too bad she’s being sent into a meat grinder.” Todd was a member of the Special Forces and shared the colonel’s skepticism about this mission. “I still can’t believe we’re sending a civilian in to gather intel. If three of the general’s intelligence goons got wasted up there, how’s she supposed to succeed? She has to get past the background screening, somehow convince the colony’s paranoid security types that she’s on Team Chrysalis, get them to cough up the list of names of people who hate the UN’s guts, which might actually be most of the colony, and come back in one piece. It’s madness.”

  The colonel frowned. “Duhrer seems to think that her being a Radcliffe will help her up there. I sure hope that’s true. I promised her parents I’d watch over her, and I’m pretty sure this isn’t what they had in mind.” He looked up from Priya’s image and focused on Todd. “Sergeant, I’m sure you’ve guessed why I read you into this.”

  “Because I have some friends who know people who might know people on the colony.”

  “That’s right. And I’d take it as a personal favor if you pull whatever strings you have. I want a twenty-four/seven overwatch on our girl when she’s up there.”

  “Colonel, I think you’re overestimating what kind of strings I may or may not have to pull. Besides, you know it’s illegal to have secure-channel communication with the colony.”

  “That’s why I’m not ordering you to do it. This is on the QT. The girl basically got railroaded by the UN types into taking this on, and it’s eating me up inside.”

  “Let me guess: the general was vague enough that he’d never be brought up on charges, but specific enough that his meaning was clear?”

  Jenkins nodded.

  “I hate when that shit happens.” Todd gave Jenkins a lopsided smile. “Well, I’ll see what I can do about those strings—but no promises.” The soldier pulled a handheld from a pocket in his fatigues and studied its screen.

  Jenkins looked once more at Priya’s holographic likeness. She looked so much like the Neeta Radcliffe of history. He hadn’t seen it when she was younger, all arms and legs and immature. But now that she was grown, both physically and in personality, the resemblance was uncanny.

  Nowadays, at least on Earth, history was often muddled and buried; the emphasis was on looking forward, not back. But Jenkins had grown up with the stories of the Great Exodus. He’d learned all about the exploits of the greats from that era. Dr. Holmes, certainly, but also Burt and Neeta Radcliffe. What they’d accomplished was amazing. They’d saved humanity, and yet they were barely footnotes nowadays. Relics of the past.

  As Priya’s image hovered above his desk, he felt like he was staring at one of those relics now. And he had sent her into danger. Not willingly, but he was responsible for her all the same.

  Todd cleared his throat to get the colonel’s attention. “Colonel? I’ve received orders to ship out to the Midwest tomorrow. Evidently there’s some militia group fronting for a bunch of farmers that don’t want to sell their produce to the collective, as required by the UN mandates for centralizing food production.”

  Jenkins grimaced. “We must all follow legal orders…” He pictured Priya boarding a transport to the colony. “No matter how distasteful they may be.”

  It was late in the afternoon, and Terry sat in his office scrolling through the emails that had been flagged by their security system. Ranger had parked himself next to his chair, facing the entrance to the office and snoring lightly. Terry looked down at the pup, and as if sensing the change in Terry’s focus, Ranger looked up at him and gave a huff before lowering his head back onto his paws and going back to sleep.

  A new e-mail arrived, and Terry opened it. The text hovering over his desk glowed yellow, indicating it was an official communique from a UN government official.

  * * *

  To: Chrysalis Education Center

  Date: 153.122 AE

  Subject: Budget approval for the upcoming semester

  * * *

  To whom it may concern:

  * * *

  Under the UN-Chrysalis Education Charter dated 77.201, the UN Education Review B
oard has approved the budgets for twenty-three new mining-related internships in the upcoming semester. Attached is the anticipated per diem associated with each student. If there are any concerns, please respond before the anticipated launch date of 153.150.

  * * *

  Carla Smith

  UN Education Council

  * * *

  Terry tapped the phone icon on his desk and selected a number on his speed dial. The call was immediately answered.

  “Bursar’s office.”

  “Hey, Tony, it’s Terry Chapper.”

  “Chap! What can I do you for?”

  “I got a favor to ask. Looks like we’re getting a fresh set of interns, twenty-three of them. Can you tell me how many we got during the last round and what we got for their upkeep?”

  “Sure, hold on a second…” There was a brief pause. “Here it is. This past semester we had twenty-one interns, and we’re getting two hundred and fifty credits per week per intern. Why do you ask?”

  Terry scrolled through the hovering spreadsheet attached to the e-mail he’d just received “Well, I’m not sure if it’s a mistake or not, but it looks like the UN’s education folks are doubling their spend to five hundred credits with the next batch.”

  “Whoa, that’s a lot of bank.”

  “So you weren’t aware of this?”

  “No. I mean, sometimes they make a cost-of-living adjustment, but that’s like a three percent increase, not a hundred percent.”

  “Okay, thanks, Tony.”

  The moment he hung up, his phone rang with another call. “Chapper.”

  “Terry, it’s almost time for the staff meeting. Where are you?”

  Terry looked at the clock. “Damn, sorry, Jean. Tell them I’ll be right there.”

  The last thing Terry needed right now was to get chewed out by the governor in front of her entire staff.

  All eight of the governor’s staff were present when Terry arrived, but the governor was not. Terry breathed a sigh of relief as he took his spot at the table.

  Governor Jenna Welch was many things to the colony. She was a no-nonsense administrator. She was very charismatic when she needed to be. And she was a brilliant strategist. However, she had absolutely no qualms about flaying someone verbally if they fell short on an obligation without good reason.

  And she was particularly annoyed when anyone was late to a meeting.

  Amanda Cummins, the head of colony agriculture, clacked her fingernails on the lacquered tabletop. “Did she cancel the meeting?”

  “No,” said Andy Gras, in a thick Hungarian accent. As the governor’s chief of staff, he was on top of her comings and goings.

  “Well, she’s never late, so—”

  Ranger whined and sat up in his spot an instant before the door opened and Governor Welch walked in. She was a fit, statuesque woman in her fifties, and despite her near-constant seriousness, for just a moment she flashed a smile at Ranger and scratched under his chin. He responded with a vigorous wag of his tail.

  Her seriousness returned as she straightened up. “I’ve brought a guest with me,” she said. As if she’d been outside waiting to be announced, a dark-skinned woman walked in and smiled. In her hands was a round metal object about eighteen inches in diameter. It looked like a picture frame, but without a picture. “This is Nwaynna Stewart, our head of advanced research and Earth-based intelligence. She was briefing me on our latest… actually, Nwaynna, why don’t you tell them.”

  “Does everyone have Deadman clearance?” Nwaynna asked.

  Deadman clearance was a classification level that had been established soon after the colony was founded. It was required for any information on the existence of non-human intelligence. Very, very few people had Deadman clearance, and only those who did were aware that there had once been alien life forms on Epsilon, the planet their colony was orbiting.

  “They’re all read in,” the governor said as she took a seat. “You can speak freely.”

  Nwaynna placed the frame on a stand at the end of the table and gave everyone a nervous smile. “Well, as you’re aware, some of the alien artifacts that were discovered on Epsilon have been useful in intelligence-gathering operations. Recently we’ve managed to get some of this tech into the office of a staff-level member of the UN intelligence wing, and it captured some video that I felt needed the governor’s attention.”

  Carl Gustav, head of mining operations, raised his hand. “Excuse me. Are we to believe we got a signal out of such a secure site? The Earth-based government may be fools, but they’re not stupid. Are we sure this, whatever it is, isn’t something they wanted us to see? You know, an orchestrated attempt to mislead us?”

  Nwaynna shook her head. “I doubt it very seriously. We’re using alien transceivers that they’re entirely unaware of and that even we cannot duplicate. The signals are operating at over one exahertz and—”

  “Miss Stewart?” Terry raised a finger. “For us meatheads who didn’t get a PhD in alien tech… exahertz?”

  She laughed. “Sorry, exahertz is a frequency. Like kilohertz and megahertz. It’s basically a billion billion waves per second. Which means these transceivers can chirp messages at over one hundred million gigabytes per second. One second of video surveillance takes all of about a nanosecond to transmit.” She turned back to Carl. “On top of which, it’s all scrambled. Given all that, it’s virtually inconceivable that anyone who doesn’t already possess this alien technology could even detect it, much less hack into it.”

  Governor Welch made a rolling motion with her hand. “Maybe you should just show us the video.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The scientist placed her fingers on two spots on the frame, and a high-definition holographic image appeared above the conference room table. It showed an office with a large desk, and sitting at the desk was a gray-haired and well-decorated general. Terry noted the small ribbon indicating this man was part of the UNIB, the UN Intelligence Bureau. The UNIB had the same mysterious reputation as organizations like the CIA, MI6, and the KGB did in centuries past—but unlike those organizations, the UNIB was attached to official military units that could control troop movements.

  The general was reading a sheet of paper. That was surprising. Did they really still use paper? The general flipped the paper over, and it sounded to Terry like it was happening right in front of him. In fact, everything in the room, audio and visual, was reproduced with remarkable fidelity.

  A knock sounded at the door.

  “Come in.”

  A soldier in fatigues walked in and took a seat in front of the general’s desk. Terry felt the hairs on his neck stand up; his swagger, his stooped posture, the white streak down the middle of his otherwise dark hair. He knew the guy.

  “Sir,” said the soldier, “I’ve got the info you were looking for.”

  “Go ahead, Sergeant.”

  “Bradshaw was ID’d by their security team last week and has been disposed of.”

  The governor shot Terry a look, her eyes flashing a warning that he’d seen many times over the years.

  “Crap.” The general leaned back in his chair. “Is this one hundred percent confirmed?”

  “Yes, sir. Our guy confirmed it through DNA evidence.”

  “Have we gotten any more on their tech?”

  “Yes and no. Our guy managed to track Bradshaw’s path through the mines. He got as far as level twelve before whatever’s down there blocked Bradshaw’s signal.”

  “Hold on. You assholes assured me that the signal couldn’t be blocked.”

  The soldier shrugged. “I don’t have an answer for you, General. All I know is that his signal disappeared, then reappeared when his body was carried out of level twelve and brought back up to the surface. By then, his vitals had flatlined. General, I know we’ve got intel about something being down there, maybe even alien tech. And we got real close this time. But since they caught Bradshaw, it’s safe to assume they’ll be on alert. We may have to hold off on things for a whil
e.”

  Terry felt a chill creep up his spine. He knew what was down there at level twelve of the mines. And now, apparently, so did someone in the UN Intelligence Bureau.

  “Negative,” said the general. “I’ve got plans for an infiltration they won’t expect. I’ll send you the details to pass on when I finalize the arrangements. Did you have anything else?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Dismissed.”

  The hologram vanished.

  “What in the world would they want down in level twelve?” said Carl. “There’s just interconnecting passages between the mine shafts and some storage down there.”

  Nwaynna was about to respond, but the governor held up her hand and cut in. “I’m sorry, Carl, you don’t have clearance.”

  Carl sputtered. “Clearance? To know what’s in the mines? I’m in charge of mining operations!”

  “And to do your job you don’t need to be aware of everything that’s down there,” the governor said firmly. “It’s from way before your time.”

  Carl’s face turned red, and he looked like he was about to explode, so Terry quickly cut in.

  “Governor, I know the man who was reporting to the general. His name is Mark Dixon. He and I were in phase one of the Q-Course together.”

  “Q-Course?” asked Amanda Cummins, head of colony agriculture.

  “It’s a qualifying course for the UN’s Special Forces down on Earth,” Terry explained. “I trained down there for about a decade.” He addressed the full staff as he continued. “Dixon washed out during phase one, and I have to say not a single soldier was sorry to see him go. He’s a real ass, and honestly I’m surprised he’s still in the service. No sane person wanted him on their squad. It worries me that someone like that, in the UNIB no less, is even close to knowing anything about what’s on level twelve. Even here on Chrysalis there’s only a handful of people who know, and only one person who can even explain what it does.”