Dystopyum (The D-ot Hexalogy Book 1)

by Chris Finkelstein

  Jan was impressed by the setup that Dom had. The stagecoach was triple the ordinary size, and had doors in the back for loading material goods, or people, depending on the job. It was quite roomy inside the cabin, and had storage capacity above the cabin as well. Dom had changed the suspension and under carriage, sealing it. It was backed up against the loading dock, ready to go.

  “What’s that thing?” Lep asked as he was surveying the stagecoach. He pointed to a big box that appeared to be bolted into the top of the cabin. It was almost as wide as the cabin, and looked heavy.

  “Oh, that?” smiled Dom. “I scouted out the rendezvous point, and outfitted this baby for anything we might run into. You better hope we don’t need that one.” He had a mischievous grin on his face.

  Lep gave him a funny look, but then their attention was drawn by two guard contisses coming their way to check out the scene. There was a heavy fence separating the guard contisses from the stagecoach and the driveway. The fence otherwise surrounded the entire complex of Strakna Laboratories.

  Jan had never seen guard contisses this close. They were fifty percent bigger than ordinary contisses, darker in coloring, and they were making Dom’s contisses very nervous. Jan went over to the fence to take a closer look at them, when Lep snapped, “What are you doing? Get away from them!”

  Jan stopped and turned. “Why?” he asked Lep.

  “They are mean as shit, that’s why!” Lep responded. “Dom’s contisses are spooked enough as it is.”

  Jan took another look at the huge beasts. He knew that they could not be mounted or ridden — they were only good for guarding territory. He turned to Lep and asked, “What do you feed them?”

  Lep looked at the contisses, and glumly said, “The kind you ride.” Then he perked up. “Well, let’s roll! We’ve got a big job ahead of us.”

  They all took the freight elevator down to the top secret fifth floor. As Lep and Jan were gathering items, Dom busied himself with dismantling the connections of one of the precious Platac-territory vaccine production modules. They worked hard, for about two hours. The freight elevator was big. It looked like they would be able to make it in one trip.

  “Well, that’s it,” said Lep, smiling at the packed and loaded elevator, “We’re ahead of schedule!”

  Dom chimed in, “There’s something I still want to do.”

  Lep said, “You still want to do that, huh?”

  “Do what?” asked Jan,

  Lep looked at Jan and replied, “He wants to go down into the bottom of this place and tinker.” He was looking at Dom and shaking his head. “We still don’t have the time, Dom.”

  Jan agreed with Lep and said, “No! Let’s just get the hell out of here! What about the guard?”

  Ignoring Jan, Dom argued, “You just said we’re ahead of schedule! Don’t worry about the guard. Lep, you know he’s sleeping by now, and there’s nobody here! It’ll only take a minute.”

  Lep studied Dom. “It is a good idea, if it’ll work.”

  He made his decision, “Go, fast, and take Jan with you just in case. We already have the elevator loaded, but I’m betting I’ll find more things to take while you guys are down there.”

  Lep was the boss here, and so it was settled. Dom and Jan took the freight elevator down into the lowest level of the building.

  On the way down, Dom told Jan what he was planning to do. “First,” said Dom, “I’m going to bypass the safety systems and turn up the heat on all the new vaccines they are making for the wildlands. It will destroy most of those vaccines, so they won’t be able to come after us for fifteen to twenty years.” He paused to smile at Jan, proud of his idea. The old freight elevator was rumbling pretty well under the weight of the load they had with them.

  After seeing that Jan understood, Dom continued, “Then, I’m going to lock up the hydrogen supply, then drain all the hydrogen out of the storage tanks down there. It’ll take them at least ten to twenty hours to figure it out and fix it all. By then, half of all the main vaccine batches in this place will be mush.” Still grinning, Dom nodding his head, “That’ll set them back a while — and the main batches will be their priority for the next ten years, giving us a twenty-five year head-start at least!” Dom thought he was part of some new super revolutionary group.

  Jan was rolling Dom’s words over in his head. “Did you say ‘drain the hydrogen’? That sounds dangerous.”

  Dom replied, “They have special pipelines built for that in case of emergency.” He paused, and looked thoughtful, “I don’t think they have ever had to use it.”

  Jan looked at him, eye-ridges coming together. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  “Me too,” said Dom, as the doors opened and he began to make his way through the huge, dimly lit area first.

  Jan could only follow as Dom traversed his way between stacks of large piping, electrical conduit, and plumbing to one section of the sprawling space down there. Dom pulled a couple tools from his kit, and turned five different-looking valves with them. After he was done with that, Jan followed him over to a big electric panel with buttons and lights.

  Dom paused, studying the panel. He looked a bit confused, and then he said, “Ah Hah!” He went over to the right side of the panel and opened it. He pulled down on a big red lever. They heard a whooshing sound, like air escaping, and the place started cooling down immediately. Dom looked at Jan, apparently quite pleased. He said, “Here we go,” and pushed a green button on the panel that was labeled, “Ex-Out”. They waited. Whatever was supposed to happen didn’t, based on Dom’s melting look of expectation, and he said, “Hmmm.” He was rubbing his chin and studying the panel.

  Then they heard it. A loud metallic creaking sound rang out, and Jan noticed the sound was coming from some big pipes above them. The pipes looked like they were bulging. He pointed to the pipes and yelled to Dom, “Does that look right?”

  Dom looked up, and his face became frozen. He quickly looked at the panel again, and pushed another button. He looked at Jan, panicked. “We’ve got to get out of here, now!”

  “No shit!” yelled Jan. They both ran the obstacle course of piping back to the elevator, and took it up to the fifth floor. It seemed like it was taking forever. As soon as the doors opened, Dom called out “Lep! Lep!”

  Lep came running around a corner. “Hey, keep it down!” he said.

  “Something went wrong,” Dom said. He looked down. “I think there might be a problem.”

  “We’ve got to get out now,” yelled Jan.

  “But I was about to get —”

  “Now!” shouted Jan.

  Lep ran and jumped into the elevator with what he could carry, and they took it up to the waiting stagecoach. They all scrambled, filling up the cargo area inside the stagecoach, and piling everything else on top against the railings. Dom had also removed the inner seats for the mission. The biggest item to haul was the vaccine module. Along with a portable power supply and accessories, it took up most of the cargo area. The stagecoach had already been backed up to the loading area, so the task went quickly enough.

  As they were loading the last of the supplies, they heard a ‘pop’ deep below the floor of the elevator. A breeze started coming up, and Dom looked at Lep with obvious fright and said, “I’m going up front to the contisses. You guys hold on.”

  Lep hopped inside the stagecoach, and Jan climbed on top, behind the driver’s seat. He was in charge of the cargo on top. It was then that he smelled the hydrogen. “I smell —”

  “I know!” Dom yelled in fright, and as he gave a crack of the whip, the contisses started for a run immediately, and they were off. They were headed for the rendezvous point at the river, but had to travel through the south part of the city first.

  Jan’s heart was racing. They made it out onto the main street, and the stagecoach was able to gain some speed. Jan looked backwards at the vaccine lab, wondering what was happening down below, when suddenly a blast came roaring out of the loading area
they had just left.

  “Yah!” Dom bellowed, as he cracked the whip again.

  Lep yelled from down below, “Did you hear that? Dom! What did you do?”

  Then there were multiple crashing, booming explosions, and from the street they could see the entire top of the first floor of the lab disintegrate into a fire ball, pushing high up into the sky. Flying particles reached them, pelting store windows and pedestrians as well. Lep climbed up from the back of the moving stagecoach, and went up beside Jan, looking back at the cloud of destruction where the lab had been. His face looked like he had seen a ghost.

  “Dom, the entire lab is destroyed! Do you know what this means?” He looked at Jan with severe gravity and said, “Most of the population here will die, and it’s our fault. It will take at least twenty years to start producing vaccines again from scratch, just for themselves.”

  Jan put his hand on Lep’s shoulder and said, “There’s nothing we can do now. We’ve just got to get to the river.” He looked around at the people moving about — people traveling, working, shopping, planning — and a feeling of remorse took hold of him, but not for long —

  Alarms sounded in the city. The boys still had a half hour’s travel to the rendezvous. Swiftly, the police were out, as well as the NOV troopers. Lep climbed back down below to keep an eye on their precious cargo.

  “I never heard that alarm before,” Jan commented to Dom, as they passed police buses and fire wagons traveling the opposite direction towards the vaccine lab. “Just act normal, don’t drive too fast.”

  Dom was obviously panicked. His face and body would freeze with fear every time they passed a police officer or trooper. We’ve got to get out of the city, Jan thought to himself. That’s the first thing we need to do.

  A few minutes from the river dock, Martha and others had gathered at the city cemetery. Over two hundred escapees had already arrived in the cemetery, and more were amassing at the river. They heard the explosion from within the city, and saw the flash and dark cloud it produced rising slowly in the night sky, accentuated by the city lights. Then they heard the sirens.

  “This is all we need,” Martha sighed.

  “What kind of alarm is that?” Rebecca asked.

  “It’s the National Emergency call to arms,” Martha replied. “All NOV personnel must report immediately. Shit, they’ll all be out now. We’ve still got to wait for everyone to gather here, and run to the river at the signal.”

  About fifteen minutes later, down at the river everything had been going according to schedule. The cemetery group was to remain separate until the last minute in order that they may more easily escape if something went wrong at the dock.

  Over three hundred LERN members had arrived at the dock, with more arriving by the minute. They were all hurriedly loading supplies onto the boats. There had been minimal security tonight. The two guards and a few workers on duty had been bound and gagged.

  A young stranger happened upon them. He had been walking rather aimlessly, and found himself strolling along an unpaved road that hugged the edge of a very high cliff. He had been able to see the river almost two thousand feet down below from the edge of the cliff at its peak. The road continued for a half mile or so, steeply downwards, ending at the dock which LERN had chosen for their departure. It was the last dock before the wildlands to the south.

  The youth had come to the river, contemplating suicide by drowning himself. He would have jumped earlier from a greater height, but was not ready for the irreversible commitment of that route. His plans began to change when he saw the gathering of people at the dock. As he was arriving, he hid behind the wagons that were gathered and was close enough to hear what was going on.

  “These people are going into the wildlands somehow!” he said to himself. He came out of the shadows.

  “Please take me with you!” he said to the first ones he walked up to. “I can help, please!” he begged.

  The biggest one there, Winoni, walked up to him and asked, “What are you doing here boy?” Winoni barked to some of the people standing around, “We need to speed this up! Help those folks with the big trunks over there!” Then he turned his attention back to the kid. “Well?”

  “I was just walking down here, and I heard you are all leaving for the wildlands,” he replied. “Please take me with you, I can help!” He started coughing.

  “What’s your name?” asked Winoni, considering it. After all, what was there to lose now that they were escaping? This kid really wants to go with us, we do have the room, and I’m going to need miners. He asked him again. “What’s your name, son?”

  “Sak,” the youth replied.

  They heard gunfire cracking from the graveyard. “Shit!” said Winoni, “That’s bad.” Then he turned his attention to those still loading up. “Move it faster, and release those boats that are full!”

  Meanwhile, at the NOV headquarters in Justilant, Griswolt, no longer having military rank, had been deputized with everyone else there. They all departed with groups of troopers sent to the south side of town.

  Griswolt was fully armed, like the others. They were accustomed to the unremarkable arrests of LERN members, but now it was different. The ones captured tonight were packed to the gills with supplies one would take when going hunting. They also had many more supplies with them that could not be explained. The NOV command had quickly assumed that there was a conspiracy afoot that was connected to the explosion at the vaccine lab. Griswolt and his particular group of fifty NOV troopers and deputies were on a search and destroy mission — kill anything that looks like an enemy during the martial law that was now in effect.

  Griswolt was sitting near the officer in charge, and overheard that the NOV had just now captured another large LERN group traveling in a convoy. This time they found fifty-three LERN members, all stocked up with survival supplies. They were presently interrogating them, but had no significant information yet. Griswolt’s group was ordered to head down to the city cemetery, because they were not far from it, and some activity had been reported there.

  “OK, let’s move!” the officer called out to his convoy, and they headed down there with increased urgency.

  After they reached the cemetery, the officer in charge sent eleven troopers and three deputies out to scout ahead and report back as the remainder policed the streets in the area. Griswolt was among those who went scouting.

  As Griswolt’s group crept quietly into the cemetery, they began to hear noises coming from the southwest. They crouched, and continued until they saw the outlines of people in small groups in the distance. “There are at least one hundred of them,” Griswolt said to the lead sergeant.

  The sergeant was looking through binoculars. “They don’t look armed.”

  They slowly made their way forward, hidden by the dark, but not for long. The clouds were giving way again, exposing the full larger moon and its little sister. They had some tombstones to hide behind.

  More gunfire was picked up north of their position, behind them. They immediately heard some frightened voices coming from their right, much closer than expected.

  That sounded just like Rebecca, Griswolt thought to himself, and then shook it off as nonsense.

  The sergeant had no choice. The moon was lighting things up, and the people they could hear were so close, he knew his group would be spotted at any moment. He motioned to everyone to head slowly in the direction of the voices.

  As they came closer, they could hear the voices more clearly. The sergeant signaled to stop. They all stopped and listened for an instant, using more tombstones for cover.

  “He’s not supposed to arrive for another ten minutes,” one of the people said.

  Martha? It can’t be! Griswolt was in shock. It couldn’t be Martha’s voice. It —

  “We’ve got to wait, they’ve got the wildlands vaccines,” a different voice said.

  Griswolt and company were mesmerized for a minute by the conversation that was taking place. The idea, the tho
ught, of an escape of lovelovers into the wildlands with vaccines was unimaginable. Griswolt was still in disbelief when the last cloud passed, and the full light of the moon revealed the group they were hearing in the night, only about fifty feet away. The troopers were still hiding behind various tombstones.

  There she is! Martha! A love-lover! How could I — Griswolt was stunned, he could not reconcile what was about to happen. He looked at Martha with what seemed like tunnel vision. She always wanted freedom. Martha, don’t leave me. Don’t go, I love you.

  He then said to himself lowly, “I love you?” with a surprised, bewildered look on his face. Then with a flash of recognition and inspiration, screamed, “I love you!” He didn’t care. What was life in this fucking world without her? The troopers around him were looking at him as if he was crazy.

  Martha and her group, startled, looked into the direction of Griswolt’s voice, and saw the shadows of the troopers moving about the tombstones.

  The lead sergeant called out, “Attack!” and immediately headed to Griswolt to check him out while the others started moving and shooting in the direction of Martha’s group.

  Griswolt screamed, “Martha! Run!” and immediately emptied a number of bullets into the lead sergeant’s gut, dropping him. Then he started gunning down the other troopers ahead who were unaware of what had just happened, given the gunfire going off now. One by one, Griswolt was able to shoot all eleven of them with his automatic weapon, disabling or killing them all.

  Martha did not run with the others. It might have been guilt over abandoning Griswolt, but she was sure she had heard his voice. Rebecca and Rachel stayed behind with her, hiding behind a big gravestone. She saw Griswolt start to run towards them after the shooting was over. She heard him shouting the words she had never, ever expected, “I love you!”

  Martha started out to meet him, but Rebecca grabbed her, and with Rachel’s help, they held her back. “I love you Griswolt!” she screamed.