The Trade of Kings

by Mike Kraus

“Be careful, mom.”

  Dianne nodded, patted Mark on the back and slipped down the stairs. She waited at the front door for several seconds before hearing three slow, steady clicks through her radio. With a racing heart and a deep breath she cracked the front door and peered out into the darkness. The house had only a few low lights on inside so her eyes needed no adjustment to the outside, and as she scanned the driveway and woods visible through the door she confirmed Mark’s signal.

  Here goes nothing. Dianne pulled open the door and stepped onto the porch, raising her rifle and preparing herself for the sudden barrage of gunfire she expected to encounter. When none came, though, she closed the door behind her and walked slowly across the porch, each step ticking softly on the wooden slats.

  The night was colder than the last, and she could see frost sparkling in the moonlight, dancing on the few blades of grass and on the edges of the leaves. A faint, light wind blew through the barren branches, causing thin, reedy shadows to wave, each one catching Dianne’s peripheral vision and making her flinch as she wondered which would turn out to be a person.

  The minutes slowly ticked by with no signs of anyone, though, and Dianne finally worked up the nerve to step off of the porch and out into the drive. She looked upward as she stepped out, craning her neck and straining her eyes to catch a glimpse of one of the security cameras that they had rigged on the upper corner of the house. She walked around for a moment, trying to find the small silver device in the shadows of the eaves when her foot collided with something on the ground. There was a sound of metal scraping against stone and dirt as the object skidded several inches across the gravel and she looked down, resisting the temptation to flick on her flashlight as she didn’t want to draw any attention to herself.

  Dianne squatted down and plucked the object from the ground, turning it over in her hand as she tried to figure out what it was. While it had the color of steel, it was lightweight, and several cracks passed through its center along with a long, slender object that was jagged and sharp at one end. She flipped the object over once more and saw three black screws hanging off of the side, then suddenly realized what she was staring at.

  The security camera had been pulled or shot down from its place high on the edge of the house, and it had suffered greatly in its fall. The silver plastic case was broken and the electronics and lens inside were broken beyond repair. While Dianne recognized the camera itself soon enough, the long shaft passing through the middle of it vexed her until she nearly cut her finger on its sharp, jagged, uneven end.

  “An arrow?” Dianne spoke the words out loud, softly, and traced the length of the piece of fiberglass. The head of the arrow was firmly embedded somewhere inside the guts of the camera while the shaft had snapped in half, most likely from the impact, shattering bits of fiberglass and leaving a dangerously sharp end sticking out of the device. Whoever had fired the arrow was clearly a good marksman, as they had managed to both destroy the camera’s function and knock it off of the house with what appeared to be a single shot.

  Whether it was the lateness of night, the long-term lack of sleep or some other factor, the seriousness and gravity of Dianne’s find didn’t set in for a few more minutes. When it did, though, she stood up straight, dropped the camera to the ground and bolted for the front door. All semblance of stealth was forgotten as she realized that there were likely eyes in the woods watching her every move. Why they hadn’t fired upon her with the same bow they had used to destroy the cameras on the house was anyone’s guess, but the last thing she wanted was to suffer from a similar fate.

  Dianne’s feet were both on the wooden porch and she was reaching for the handle of the front door when a searing, red-hot pain exploded in her lower left leg. Though her brain was sending it signals to keep moving, to keep her up and continue going toward the door, Dianne’s leg didn’t listen. She felt like she was moving in slow motion as she collapsed to the ground, just barely grabbing onto the handle to keep herself partially upright, wondering why her leg had stopped working and why it hurt so very much.

  As Dianne Waters looked down and saw the fiberglass shaft of an arrow protruding through her calf, she realized what had happened. The men they had driven off weren’t taking a few days to lick their wounds. They might not have even been driven off in the first place. They had regrouped, formed a new strategy and had managed to successfully sabotage one of the most important parts of the house’s defense mechanisms. They had drawn her outside, wounded her and were likely preparing to do something even worse.

  The battle for the Waters’ homestead had finally come to a head, and it was about to get far, far worse.

  Chapter 14

  Three days before the mission

  Deep in the Republic of Bashkortostan, Russia

  Beneath Mount Yamantau

  Ostap Isayev is not normally a nervous man. A career soldier and veteran of countless wars fought in both the light and the shadow, he is used to interacting with people of all statures in government and civilian life. Extracting information from an adversary in the field, performing a night raid on terrorists who have kidnapped dozens of schoolchildren or performing HALO jumps into the heart of enemy territory have nothing on the current situation.

  As the weaponized computer virus continues to escalate its attacks across the globe, the Russian government is in a state of turmoil. Inside the mountain bunker the President still reigns supreme, but fractures are forming as small groups of military personnel begin whispering about how things should be done. Unlike most parts of the world where one of the biggest issues is a lack of food and water, the slow-burning chaos inside the mountain is focused on things further up on the hierarchy of needs.

  “Mr. President?” The office is cold and dark, chilled by the layers of impenetrable rock that surround it and all the rest of the bunker. A small fire crackles off in a corner, one of the luxuries afforded to the man who was once in charge of an entire nation.

  “Da.” The answer comes from a large chair near the fire. The outline of an outstretched arm appears, and the figure beckons Ostap to draw closer.

  “You wanted to see me, sir?”

  “Da.” There is a long moment of silence following the answer before the man speaks again. “You have been given your mission, correct?”

  “Yes, sir. And all of the relevant information surrounding it. We will stop this weapon, Mr. President, or—”

  “Nyet. You will not.”

  “I… sir?”

  Another long silence. “You will not stop the weapon. Not completely.”

  Ostap’s initial panic at the President’s negative response quickly turns to confusion. He stands near the chair, opening and closing his mouth as he struggles to figure out what to say. The President continues before he can say anything.

  “This ‘Damocles’ is a weapon that we must have in our arsenal, if we want to rebuild in this shattered world. Once you have retrieved the access information for the weapon, you will transmit that information back to us. You will not shut down the weapon yourself. We will access it, analyze it and ensure that it no longer poses a threat to our people.” The President turns in his seat and faces Ostap, his thin eyes cold and hard as he studies the figure standing nearby. “Do you understand?”

  “Of course, sir. We’ll handle it.”

  “Good.” He shifts back to his original position. “Ensure that your partner knows about this requirement. Do not inform the technicians, however. Once they have retrieved and verified the information is legitimate, you are to consider them expendable.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The silence from the President is a notice. Ostap is to leave. He gladly does, exiting the room as quickly as possible. Though he does not understand the intricacies behind the order he has been given, he will obey it without question, no matter who or what stands in his way.

  Chapter 15

  The Waters’ Homestead

  Outside Ellisville, VA

  “Mom!” Mark shouted
as he opened the door, having seen what happened through one of the front windows. Dianne waved him back as she struggled to pull herself through the door, expecting another arrow to come flying in and embed in her back or skull at any second. Mark reached out and pulled her inside, twisting her leg and sending another wave of pain through it as the arrow flexed and bounced. “Mom, what happened?”

  “Arrow. Leg. Close the door. They’re outside… in the woods.” Dianne spoke haltingly as she struggled to remain calm. Her pant leg was slick and heavy with blood and she ground her teeth together as she rolled over, handing her rifle to Mark as she kicked the door shut with her right leg. Mark furiously scrabbled with the latches before turning and sprinting for the kitchen, calling out for Tina in a loud stage whisper.

  “Dianne, what the—holy hell, what happened to you?!” Tina ran into the foyer and stared at Dianne lying on the floor for a few seconds before jumping into action. She reached down and helped Dianne up and onto the nearby bench, then knelt down to examine her leg. “How’d you take an arrow through your leg?”

  Dianne waved Tina off, shaking her head. “No time. They’re outside. They shot out the cameras with arrows as a distraction.”

  “They shot them out… with arrows?” Tina’s eyes grew wide.

  “They’ve got to be trying something; maybe trying to break in, or something else. Where are Jacob and Josie?”

  “In the kitchen with Jason. Sarah’s watching out the back door, but—” A scream from the other side of the house cut through Tina’s words, chilling Dianne to the bone and momentarily making her forget all about her pain. Before she or Dianne could react, though, there was the sound of several gunshots followed by Sarah’s panicked shouting.

  “They’re on the back porch! They’re coming in!”

  Dianne lunged for her rifle, toppling from the bench in the process, while Tina snatched at the pistol on her waistband and charged back toward the kitchen and living room. “Get them downstairs, hurry!” Tina shouted at Jason, who was already up and out of his seat at the dining room table, getting his rifle ready to fire across the living room at the back door. Sarah, meanwhile, was backpedaling from the door, firing her rifle at it in random spots, trying to stop the men who had suddenly appeared on the porch from advancing any farther.

  As Jason started to squeeze the trigger on his rifle to put more blind fire through the back door, Tina swatted at the rifle, forcing it down to the ground as she shouted at him again. “Get them out right now, Jason!” Jason hesitated, glancing at Jacob and Josie who were cowering in their chairs from the nearby gunshots, then relented. He threw his rifle over his shoulder and grabbed at both Jacob and Josie as Tina threw open the door to the basement.

  While the basement door was still being thrown open by Tina, the back door to the house suddenly exploded inward, showering the living room with shards of glass and wood. An intense flash of light and an overwhelmingly loud bang accompanied the explosion, making it impossible for anyone in the living or dining room to see what was going on.

  While Dianne was stuck in the front of the house in severe pain, trying to hobble around through the small side room and through to the living room from the opposite side of the kitchen, she was too late to be of any use. With blood dripping steadily onto the wood floor as she pulled herself forward, she too was blinded by the flash and the ringing in her ears kept her from hearing anything. She thought about blind-firing into the living room, weighing the risk of hitting Sarah with potentially taking out one or more of the intruders, but the risk was too great and the reward was middling. She had no idea how many invaders were about to pour into her house, and didn’t even know if she could aim in the general direction of the back door.

  Several seconds later, the battle for the Waters’ homestead was over. Seven heavily armed men poured through the back door, their muddy, booted feet clomping as they ran through the living and dining room throwing weapons to the ground, kicking the feet out from under the survivors and swiftly securing them with zip-ties.

  “Is that all of them?” The voice thundered through the house, coming from a man looking in through the back door. As Dianne’s vision slowly returned to her she looked in his direction, realizing with no small amount of horror that he was the same man in the red shirt that she had seen in the gas station compound, the de facto leader of the group.

  He was of average height and build and sported a thick beard and a short-cropped haircut that gave him a scruffy but militant appearance. He wore thick tan canvas pants, the same red t-shirt she had seen on him before and an unzipped dark green jacket, also made of canvas. The slight bit of exposed skin she could see harbored thick layers of dirt, grease and grime and both he and his men smelled like they had never showered—even before the apocalypse. Unlike the others, though, he didn’t carry a rifle, but he did have an oversized holster strapped to his leg containing a large, silver revolver whose barrel was sticking out through the bottom.

  “How many were there supposed to be, Michael?” One of the men turned to the man in the red shirt, who promptly rolled his eyes and sighed.

  “Bunch of useless idiots. Stand aside, dammit!” He barged in through the door, pushing his men aside and stared at the group of tied-up prisoners lying on the carpet. Dianne stared up at him through wide, unblinking eyes, finally knowing the name of the leader of the group that had antagonized her, her family and her friends since the event took place.

  “No, that’s not all of ‘em. You got two women and a couple of kids. Wasn’t there a man here, too? The one we shot but who got away? And what about that woman they took from us?” Michael turned and looked around, his eyes finally settling on Jason’s wife. “You. Where’s the other man and woman?”

  Dianne shifted her stare to Sarah before glancing around the room, realizing that there were actually three people missing. Mark, Tina and Jason were nowhere to be seen, and the door to the basement was closed tight. She looked back at Sarah and pleaded silently with her eyes, hoping that Sarah would be quick enough to think up something believable.

  “My husband’s dead.” Sarah replied flatly, sneering at the man. “He died after we got him back. Severe infection from the gunshot you bas—”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Michael waved her off, “save it. What about the woman, the one you all took from the station?”

  Sarah shrugged and let her head sag back to the ground as she closed her eyes. “She left. You killed her husband, too. She swore she’d find a way to get revenge for it.”

  “Ha.” Michael snorted out a dry laugh and looked down at Jacob and Josie. Dianne saw his gaze shift toward them and struggled to move, but the pain in her leg from the still-embedded arrow and the fact that her hands were tied behind her back kept her from going anywhere. Michael, however, caught her movement and took a step over to her and crouched down next to her face.

  “And you… I think my men know you pretty well. They’ve described you well enough for me. The ones who’ve survived, anyway. These your little brats?”

  “Stay the hell away from them.” Dianne’s response came out like a viper’s venom, unlike the relatively detached reply that Sarah had given. Jacob and Josie were both being surprisingly quiet, but Dianne could see that they were in shock, their eyes wide with fear.

  Michael laughed and stood back up, looking around at his men. “Check the house top to bottom. Once it’s clear, we head out.” He looked back at Dianne and smiled cruelly, exposing rows of pearly white teeth. “Time to replace some of that labor we lost.”

  Dianne and Sarah shouted at the men as Jacob and Josie were roughly picked up and tossed over shoulders, but their screams of protest were drowned out by the laughter of the triumphant horde. They ransacked the house as they searched for other survivors, taking food, water, medical supplies and any ammunition and weapons that weren’t at least casually concealed. Dianne did her best to fight against the men, but her blood loss was continuing to accelerate and she found herself growing too weak to eve
n stand up on her own. Throughout the process, though, and even as she, Sarah, Jacob and Josie were being dragged down the driveway to be thrown into vehicles, Dianne didn’t see any sign of Mark, Tina or Jason.

  They had, quite astonishingly, vanished.

  Chapter 16

  ISS, International Space Station

  “Well, this is fun.” Jackie sighs as she squeezes the last bit of paste out of a foil packet. The “meal”—if it can even be called one—is more depressing than anything else, though her survival instincts override her malaise.

  “You really want to be out here?” Commander Palmer’s voice is tinny as it comes through the short-range radio, and Jackie reaches out to flip a switch on the control console.

  “Anything’s better than being in here,” she replies. “It wouldn’t be so bad if we could at least turn on the receiver and see what’s going on down there.”

  “We’ll know soon enough, Jackie.” Ted’s voice comes through, just as tinny as Commander Palmer’s. “Hang tight; we’ll be done here in fifteen or so.”

  Jackie sighs and pushes herself off of the nearest wall toward a trash receptacle mounted on the opposite side of the room. She stuffs the empty foil packet inside and pushes herself back toward the control console. As per her standard operating procedures, she checks the gauges and dials and lights and readouts, comparing them to numbers she knows by heart, even on the older systems of the ISS.

  After four days spent in the comparatively cramped quarters of the old station, she almost wishes she had stayed onboard the ISS-2, despite the fact that it is only a day or so away from burning up in the atmosphere. The plan to refuel the escape module and use it to get back to Earth went awry after the jury-rigged refueling lines became clogged. Commander Palmer and Ted have been on seven spacewalks to try and repair them, though each potential fix merely reveals yet another problem with the aging station.