Jessica set her fork down and started to rise. "Must be the medcenter."
“Not necessarily, sweetheart. I'll get it.” Still in sleep shorts and robe, O’Brien shoved his chair back and pushed himself up. “Been so long I’d nearly forgotten the com had that feature. I’m finished anyway.” He caught her worried frown as she gathered the breakfast dishes.
Unlike most quarters, the general manager’s suite included a full kitchen, spacious dining and common rooms, study and two sleep rooms. Abstract art produced by creative residents enlivened the otherwise spartan furnishings. Tables and chairs were molded of opaque sea-moss polymers with mauve faux-leather paisley print cushions.
O’Brien sat before the com and keyed the viewer. Tammer’s face appeared with the alien ship’s bridge in the background. He looked concerned more than frightened or worried. “What's up?”
“I just heard from James Buckheit, Colonel. Humans attacked his hauler just outside the loading bay. He's heading home with wounded.”
“Have you secured?” As he spoke, O’Brien keyed up the security center and sent a simple command to scramble a rescue/defender team.
“Yes, of course. What do you want me to do?”
“Sit tight. I’ve dispatched a team.”
“Colonel.” Tammer flushed. “We haven’t seen survivors since the Professor. Since I hadn’t conceived of the possibility there might be others alive hereabouts, I let Cantera take the external sensorcon offline to examine the correlation matrix. Would you please extend my apologies to the injured?”
"A coincidence, Tammer. Not your fault."
"Yes, of course, and thank you, Colonel, but that does little to assuage my guilt. You should also know that our people were unarmed. I’ve informed Linda.”
“Myer?”
“Jeffries now, Colonel.”
“Yes, I know. Old habits...” He forced a reassuring smile. “Keep the ship sealed tight.”
“As you say, Colonel." Tammer’s image blinked out, leaving a blank white screen.
The com beeped softly and O’Brien tapped a key to acknowledge the on-duty security officer. A pinched-nose, cropped-headed image sprang to life.
“Colonel?”
“One of our haulers has been shot up.”
“Yes, sir. An RD team is assembling in the upper bay.”
“I’m on my way.”
“Yes, sir.” The vid blinked out.
“Jess.” O’Brien rose and hurried into the sleep room where she had laid out his thermal clothing: gray, long-sleeve, turtleneck pull over, gray slacks, black socks and boots.
“Trouble?” On the edge of the sleeper, Jessica ran a hand down her lightly tanned and shapely calf, seductively revealed beneath a delicate white lace robe. Dauber lay at her feet.
“You were listening.” Stripped to his briefs, he hurriedly dressed, skipping his morning ritual of sonic shower and body-prep, but grabbed a quick refresh with the dentamask.
He pecked her on the cheek at the door, started to slip by, but held back. They shared a lingering kiss. “Um,” He caressed the small of her back, all too cognizant of the flimsy barrier keeping him from her warm and familiar skin. “Might just turn out to be a profitable day, providing the hostiles aren’t as hostile as they appear. Odd that our patrols haven’t come across them before now.”
She teased his chest with her lips. “You’ll make them our friends. In case you don't recall, I’m on midday at the medcenter.”
“I’ll probably see you there.” He kissed her on the nose and gazed into her smoky-jade eyes, then slipped from her arms. "I love you."
"Love you," she called after him.
The door swooshed closed behind him. Her tantalizing aroma lingered in his thoughts.
"Cart'." On his way to the upper chamber, their tender moment succumbed to the needs of his people.
09:53 Hours May 23, 2086
Minutes from NAORC, O’Brien’s silver flyer — an oversized surfboard with rounded sides, three pivot chairs and a central con — reached the bullet pocked hauler. Three of the seven passengers were lying in the cargo area.
“Shut down, Buckheit,” O’Brien called to the driver. “We’ll airlift the wounded. You okay to drive it home?” A molecular physicist, Buckheit had volunteered to shuttle Tammer's investigators as an excuse to go topside regularly, O’Brien recalled.
“Sure, Colonel. No problem.”
The scientist sounded solid enough. O’Brien tossed him an offhand salute and gave Kielman the nod to continue. Both med flyers landed beside the hauler, while the two combat flyers trailed after O’Brien.
Since learning of the attack, a cold fury had built in O'Brien. An encounter with topside humans should not have resulted in casualties. There had to be a rational explanation for the shooting, but that did little to check his anger.
Should the strangers prove to be unreasonable, the five troopers accompanying him were armed with lasrifles and side arms. One flyer sported an eight-millimeter lascannon.
Near treetop level, they followed a gravel road carved through the wild in the first year after the bombardment. They emerged from the forest cover to find armed men arrayed outside the landing bay of the alien ship. While his companions dashed for cover among boulders strewn about the base of the cliff, one brazen soul stayed put, his rifle aimed squarely at O’Brien,
“Shields on!” O’Brien ordered. Shimmering globes pearled the air about the flyers. The gunman let loose a volley, but the shields absorbed the energy and the slugs fell harmlessly to the ground.
“Kielman, land in front of the shooter.” O’Brien swallowed his anger. These men were no match for them. “Not too close. Give him some room. The rest of you,” he waved the other flyers back, “form a perimeter.”
Kielman landed the flyer several yards from the shooter, who lowered his rifle, but stood defiant, shoulders square, mouth set in a grim slash.
A local farmer, O’Brien concluded, noting the dirty brown leather Stetson, coarse plaid jacket, jeans and work boots. Open sores dotted the gunman’s weathered face. He looked to be in his 70s.
“We’re not your enemy,” O’Brien challenged, “Why did you to shoot my people?”
“Where do you come from," the man asked in clipped tones, "flying those air-boats? Ain’t nothin’ like that around here. Least wise, nothin’ I ever saw.”
“You’ve seen haulers. Same principle.” O’Brien nodded in Kielman’s direction and made a slashing sign, but his eyes never left the shooter.
He took a calculated risk the gunman wasn’t a hothead, though he assumed there were rifles aimed at him. Regardless, he had to show the strangers he meant them no harm. O’Brien’s gut tightened and his mouth went dry. The shield blinked out. He stepped over the side and approached to within a few feet of the man, keeping his expression neutral, his sidearm holstered.
“Yeah, so what? You’re tellin’ me the aliens don't have anythin’ like that? Hell and damn. How I know you ain’t the aliens, or workin’ for them?” He spat a thin brown stream to the side, but didn’t look away.
O’Brien noticed the lump under the man’s lower lip. Chewing tobacco? Where did they get it? Surely they hadn’t grown it.
“There are no aliens on Earth. They bombed us and left. We’re survivors, just like you.”
“Like us, huh? Dressed like that in this cold? Nothin’ right about ya, if you ask me.” The man leaned over and spat again while keeping a wary eye on the well-groomed and lightly clad man before him.
Though O’Brien’s clothing did not protect him as effectively as the skin-tight black anti-radiation suits worn by the RD team, the outfit set him apart and worked well enough when combined with a clear ointment applied to his bare skin.
O’Brien nodded. “True. Our clothing is enhanced to protect and warm.” O’Brien waved his arm in a semi-circle, careful to move slowly, predictably. ”We can offer you this technology, share food and meds. Fighting us will just get you killed.”
The
man rubbed his jaw and looked to his men. Hesitant, they came out from hiding to stand beside him. An ordinary lot in coarse blue denim and heavy wool or leather jackets with an assortment of hunting rifles and shotguns held at the ready.
“How we know you’re not working with the aliens?”
“They call themselves Cargans. Once they bombed us into oblivion, they left. We will share their technology with you.”
“How so?” The man’s skepticism took on a less derisive tone.
“Take a walk inside the ship with me and I'll show you. We've nothing to hide.”
“How we know it ain’t a trap?” His eyes narrowed to slits and his hands tightened on the rifle.
O’Brien purposely turned his back on him, shoulder muscles tightening where he hoped not to take the bullet. “Kielman. Holster your weapon. The rest of you,” he waved to the flyers holding back, “go home. We’ll be along shortly. Here.” He released his gun belt and tossed it to Kielman, who caught it with a flourish and laid it on the deck of the flyer.
With slow determination, O’Brien advanced until he stood at arm's length from the man. “I have a wife and several hundred people who rely on me.” O’Brien offered his hand. “I’m sure you have loved ones as well. Trust between us must start here.”
The man hesitated, then cautiously accepted O’Brien’s outstretched hand and shook it. His grip was firm, no-nonsense.
“I'm Randall Olsen. I own a farm not far from here...or did thirty years ago. Don't make no never mind now. Me and seventeen kin live in caves nearby.”
“I’m Colonel Kaider O’Brien, USAF. I live in a cave too.”
“Colonel O’Brien...of the Mars Expedition?” At once wary and confused, Olsen stepped back. His hand edged close to his rifle’s trigger guard.
The reaction wasn’t lost on O’Brien. “Yes. I crashed this Cargan ship here nearly thirty years ago.”
“That’s not possible.” Olsen relaxed a notch. He crossed his arms over his rifle and pursed his lips. “Something that big, we would’ve heard it. Besides, you’d be my age.”
“We recovered something from the Cargans that retards aging.” O’Brien motioned towards the ship. “Walk with me, Randall. Bring as many men as you like.” Olsen’s men followed his lead and lowered their weapons. They seemed willing to listen, as long as Randall Olsen did.
Olsen glanced around at his motley bunch. All were old enough to have been born before the bombardment. “Teeter, Mark, Roger. You’re with me. The rest of ya, keep an eye on our friend out here.”
Randall Olsen didn’t buy it. At least not all of it. He would have to be convinced. How had they survived the bombardment and the nuclear winter that followed? For NAORC to remain functional for the long haul, they needed new sources of edibles and raw materials for manufacturing. Perhaps Mr. Olsen could be of help in that regard.
O’Brien motioned for Olsen to join him and turned towards the landing bay portal. “When did you come across this ship?”
The hatch lifted with a gentle whoosh as they approached. Randall flinched, but kept walking.
“One of my boys come upon it yesterday. We waited until daylight to have a look. That’s when we saw the hauler. Thought you were aliens.”
“Are there others holed up like yourselves...that you know of?”
“We see others now and then. Mostly headed south.”
“We assumed we were the only humans left around here. You give us hope”
“Tell me about this ship,” Randall said when they passed into the murky darkness of the landing bay. An overhead halolamp blinked on, throwing the bay in sharp relief.
“The bridge is still intact, but most of the vessel has been stripped. We kept enviros operational and set up living quarters for those researching the archives. The transports you see here can’t fly in our atmosphere...”
19:21 Hours June 21, 2092 – Earth (6 years later)
Willard Jeffries wiped his mouth with a white cloth napkin and leaned back. “So, Colonel, Linda tells me you made contact with another group of topsiders this morning. Seems you’ve become quite the diplomat.”
He and his wife, Linda Myer, and a few others, had joined the O’Brien’s for an impromptu dinner party. As with the other men, he had arrived wearing dark featherfiber slacks and a light patterned polyfiber polo shirt: the current fashion.
“We’ve heard Kielman’s team found four men,” Linda explained, “who speak a foreign language.” She had surprised them by showing up in med-scrubs and a white lab coat which she hung on the back of her chair.
O’Brien chuckled. “I’ve already heard three versions of how Rittman’s, not Kielman’s, patrol stumbled into them.”
Since new arrivals were rare in NAORC, O'Brien had expected it to be the first subject of discussion, but dinner passed without mention. In the background, threads of an instrumental produced by a young woman born days after the bombardment lent a comforting air to the gathering.
“So, Colonel. Care to enlighten us further?” Daniel Rathke, NAORC’s director of biological research, asked.
O’Brien sipped from a tumbler of iced tea while recalling Rittman’s debriefing. “Rittman couldn’t understand them at first, but eventually they admitted they spoke English. They reverted to their native tongue to honor their ancestors. Seems they were working an abandoned copper mine when the bombardment began. Had enough supplies to last a few weeks. Many of those camped outside died before they realized radiation was killing them. The survivors moved deeper into the mine where they had access to uncontaminated water. When the food ran out, they lived off bats and whatever else they could find.”
“So, where did you leave it with them?” Daniel asked.
“Negotiations are in progress as we speak. Not that there are significant issues to iron out, but they seem to need to do this. We’ll be exploring a number of matters with them, providing their attorney agrees to the format.”
“Good one, Colonel,” Doomes chuckled, then frowned. “They actually have a lawyer?”
“Rest easy, my friend. They are an agreeable lot and have already provided Lowe with a veritable treasure trove of books and historical documents salvaged from as far away as Spokane. They’ve met other survivors in the region, mostly small families, and saw the nuclear sub crew come ashore a few weeks ago, but didn’t make contact. ”
“Regarding Tammer,” Daniel swallowed a mouthful of green-apple pie, his second helping, then continued, “I understand he’s become quite the historian. Mandy told me he was Monday night’s guest speaker at the ‘Nature in the Absurd’ symposium. Said the Cargans are far from being the only aliens tromping about the galaxy, but they’re the only ones who seek out and destroy space-capable cultures.”
Jessica placed a hand on O’Brien’s. “My turn, dear.” Though subdued by the deep blue sunflower print shift she had chosen, much to O’Brien’s consternation, mere minutes before the first guest arrived, her eyes sparkled.
“As a matter of fact, Tammer also disproved his own theory that the Cargans were the biblical sons of God. It turns out Hebrew is an intergalactic language, introduced to humans around seven thousand years ago, when a Femidian exploration ship made an emergency landing near Cairo in the Islamic Federation. They spent years searching for raw materials to repair their ship. When they got home, they told their people about our planetary system. For two thousand years it was a playground for archeologists and adventure seekers, up until their version of a galactic council banned visitations to planets with established, pre-intergalactic cultures. They were afraid of contaminating our social development...or something like that.”
Willard chuckled and the others joined in. “You’re telling me that the foundation of Christianity is based on extraterrestrial vacationers?”
“Not at all. He says all they gave us was the language. Christianity is entirely an Earth bound phenomena. He did find references to the Greeks, whom the Femids called Gracos. The Gracos worshipped the Lallils, alias Zeus and al
l that bunch, but were in fact a race from the outer fringes of the galaxy. Our ancestors had numerous contacts with extraterrestrials, but their impact on human religious beliefs and practices seems to have been quite localized.”
“Most interesting,” Willard mused, “I may attend the next symposium. I had no idea they were so informative. Will Tammer speak again?”
Jessica smiled. “The director asked him to come back next month.”
“Now, if anyone would like to help me clear the table, the rest of you can go to the living room,” Jessica said, rising.
“I’ll help, Jess.” Linda gave her husband a peck on the cheek and pushed back her chair. “Anyone want more?”
All demurred. She picked up a platter with the remains of a sizable baked ham and followed a dish laden Jess into the kitchen.
Thanks to yet another school project, the farm — a section of the arboretum where critters such as pigs and chickens roamed free — had increased production three fold in the past year. Fresh meat and poultry were still limited, but the occasional ham dinner was a welcome addition to their primarily vegetarian diet.
Mandy, usually the last to volunteer, collected a handful of dishes and followed the other women. Dressed informally in tan slacks and a yellow cardigan over a white tube-top, her outfit did little to conceal her ample breasts and rounded belly. Among the oldest of the NAORC family, her and husband Ronald, absent from the gathering, were in their late nineties, though their physical age had been arrested in their early sixties. With near flawless olive skin, the crow's feet at the corners of her eyes barely noticeable, she seldom wore makeup.
Politely uprooted from the table, Doomes settled into an upholstered sea moss-green slider-rocker beside the picture window. It was exhibiting a mountainous landscape and a wide, glittering blue river snaking through a great forest. Flat, ribbed clouds scudded across the sky and a distant rainstorm darkened a peak. O’Brien took up position on the arm of a matching loveseat, Jeffries in a formsit beside Doomes and Rathke on the loveseat.
Doomes lit a toke, sucked until the tip was an angry red and passed it to Jeffries, who passed it to Rathke, who took a hit and passed it to O’Brien. Though he seldom partook, O’Brien sucked in a shallow hit and passed it back to Doomes. The toke made its rounds until spent, then landed in a crystal tray Jessica had acquired for that very purpose. Marijuana, a gentle intoxicant, grew easily and came into common usage after O’Brien’s band of survivors arrived with the hauler-full.
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