The second portion of Beagle’s reentry went exactly as planned, with Sif making minor course corrections, flipping the tail of the ship around at just the right moment to perform the main thruster braking maneuver, and piloting her through the familiar blue skies of a planet they no longer knew. Roughly forty-five minutes after dropping away from Resolute’s belly, Beagle touched down within two miles of its projected landing spot, a place once known as the Red River Valley, Wind Cave National Park, South Dakota.
Sif and Hunter were home.
Chapter 23
North American Alliance Staging Point
Ellsworth Field, South Dakota
From what Major Kyle Murphy heard over the radio, the months of planning and surveillance paid off. He watched the C-130 taxi to its parking spot, and the pilot shut down the number two inboard engine. He approached as one of the crew members lowered the entrance door on the forward left side of the fuselage and stepped down the stairs, ripping the mask from his face and taking a deep breath.
“What’s the count?” Murphy yelled, pointing at the back of the plane.
“Eighty-four,” the man shouted over the engines, then added, “We lost four of our own.”
Major Murphy took the tally sheet from the crew member’s hand and gave it a quick glance—seventy adults, forty-five male and twenty-five female, including two that were pregnant. Bonus.
He sidestepped as stretchers bearing the four dead were carried off the plane. He shook his head. Killed by primitive arrows and knives. Inhuman, that’s what they were. Uncivilized savages. Sometimes he felt as if he were stranded in the late nineteenth century, holed up in a fort surrounded by the modern-day equivalent of the Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota, with a Little Bighorn awaiting him every time he opened the gates. Only difference was, Custer never dealt with the Riy. And they were getting too close for comfort.
He looked back down at the paper in his hands. Six adults killed during capture and another ten injured severely enough that their long-term survival was questionable—not too high a percentage, considering the size of this tribe—but no matter, because there were also fourteen children listed, ranging in age from a few months to preteen, eight male and six female. The kids were important, a priority, well worth the four men he lost.
Remote surveillance identified a population of over one hundred living in the cave dwelling, so they captured the majority of this particular tribe, the last organized dwelling in this sector. The stragglers who escaped weren’t worth pursuing. With the Riy advancing northward, they wouldn’t last long.
He tapped the sheet with his finger and smiled. Eighty-four safely sedated in the rear cargo hold, a good haul. As soon as the ground crew refueled the aircraft, it and its precious cargo would head north. His superiors would be pleased.
His aide called to him, motioning him away from the plane. “Sir!”
“What’s the problem, Lieutenant?”
“Phoenix is on the horn, sir. You’re going to want to hear this.”
PART II: BADLANDS
Chapter 24
Red River Valley
Wind Cave National Park, South Dakota
Sif could barely move. The lower gravity on Mars would have been easier to deal with than this. ISS crew members who spent a year in space had told her readjusting to gravity would be tough, but this was ridiculous. “Jesus, Hunter. I can barely even lift my arm.”
He struggled to reach something on the far side of his seat, grunting as he did so. He held up a long pointer with a rubber pad at the end. “That’s why they gave us these,” he said. “Go-go-gadget finger.”
With it, Hunter was able to select the post-touchdown checklist on their upper screens, and together they ran through the ship’s systems, checking status.
“That was an excellent flying job, Sif. Couldn’t have done better myself.”
They were still in their suits but released their harnesses. Sif shifted in her seat to look at him, surprised at the effort it took to make such a simple motion. She missed the freedom of movement she enjoyed in zero-g. “You’re just jealous.”
“No, Sif,” Hunter said. “I’m serious. We’re alive right now because of you.”
She was a little taken aback, as Hunter had never said anything like that to her before. Lucas was right. As long as she had known Hunter, everything was a competition, at least as far as she was concerned.
“I couldn’t have done what you did, Caitlyn. Putting you in that pilot seat was the smartest decision they ever made.”
“Thank you,” Sif finally said, suddenly at a loss for words. Hunter had never called her by her real name before, either. She would have to ponder it later, though, because something was malfunctioning. “Hunter, look at engine number three, display A-seven. The fuel turbopump is throwing a fault.”
“I see it. Confirmed. Fault five nine nine.”
They both looked up the fault code on their screens—knowing a five-series code wasn’t the kind they wanted to see—and immediately realized they were in trouble. “We can’t fix this, Hunter,” Sif said. “The pump is seized. Removal and replacement.”
Hunter leaned back in his seat, took a deep breath. He knew that without the pump, they were down an engine, and getting back to Resolute was impossible without all four engines. Stranded by a piece of equipment small enough that he could hold it in his lap. But then he remembered. “We’ll have Lucas send a replacement down on one of the cargo landers.”
“It’s time to give him a ring anyway,” Sif said, “considering I kind of left him hanging there.”
“Yeah, you did. He still has no idea we’ve landed.”
“He might think we burned up.” Sif toggled the comm button. “Resolute, this is Beagle. Over.” She waited for a response. “Resolute, this is Beagle. Over.” Again, nothing. “Resolute, come in, please, this is—” Then she remembered. “Oh, crap. We’re line of sight.”
“You’re right,” Hunter said, holding his hands up. “Hey, this is getting easier already.”
Sif raised her arms, as well, and noticed the same thing. Even though it still took some effort to move, it was getting easier. Their bodies were already adjusting to Earth’s gravity. “Thank God,” she said, “I can’t wait to get out of this seat and set foot on good old terra firma again.”
“We’ll try Lucas again in about thirty minutes. He should be breaking the horizon by then. Ready to rotate yet?” Hunter asked.
“I’m ready if you are.” For takeoff and landing, their seats—and the cockpit itself—were situated in line with the ship’s beam. They were reclined, facing the nose of the ship with their backs to the ground. Beagle’s cockpit was essentially a ball with pivot points on either side, allowing the crew to change the position in order to ease access to the seats when Beagle was on the ground. “Alignment safety, off. Rolling.”
With a whir, the entire cockpit, displays and all, slowly rolled forward, eventually stopping when their seats were in a full upright position. Between their seats—on what was the floor of the ship a minute ago—was a ladder leading from the cockpit to the lower portion of the ship. As the cockpit moved, the upper windows slid behind their seats, and two side windows—larger, but still shuttered—rotated into view. The cockpit locked into place with a clunk. “Alignment safety back on,” Sif said. “Ready for the windows?”
“Let’s take a look.”
They undid the locking clamps and slid the covers forward on their rails.
The view took Sif’s breath away. Apart from the blue sky and brush here and there, the landscape looked so much like . . .
“Mars,” Hunter said. “It looks just like Mars.”
The lay of the ground, and its red color, resembled the planet they were supposed to have stepped foot on. “I was thinking the same thing,” Sif said, placing her gloved hand against the glass.
They were both silent for a time, thinking about what might have been. They could recite the names by memory: Armstrong and Aldrin, Conrad an
d Bean, Shepard, Mitchell, Scott, Irwin, Young, Duke, Cernan and Schmitt. Wagner, Webb, and Hoover were supposed to join those names as the only people to walk on another celestial body. But, as was the case with Jim Lovell and Fred Haise on the ill-fated Apollo 13 mission, it was just not meant to be.
“We would’ve made it,” Sif finally said.
“Yeah, I think we would have.”
The sun was low on the horizon—night was approaching. The stars were beginning to show themselves outside Hunter’s west-facing window. In a way, it was a comforting feeling. They were alive and unhurt, and they were back home.
Only problem was, it wasn’t the home they had left. The Earth they knew was gone—wiped away by an unexplained catastrophe, the details of which they could only guess. If there were survivors—and the fire they saw from orbit suggested as much—then they were nearby, only a few miles away. The location of the fire should be only a quarter mile to the southwest, if they had landed where they were supposed to.
“I suggest we wait until daybreak to start exploring,” Hunter said. “I don’t think we know enough yet to go stumbling around in the dark.”
Sif nodded. “I agree.” She undid her gloves, then released her helmet clasps. With a twist, she removed her helmet and hung it on the bulkhead by her seat, noticing how heavy it felt. She wiped her face with the palm of her hand and rubbed her eyes. “I think we could both use a little shut-eye.” Below them, in the middle of the ship, were two fold-down cots—what Lucas called fifteen-million-dollar Murphy beds.
Hunter removed his helmet, as well, and eased himself off the seat. “It’s going to take a while to lose our sea legs, anyway. I still feel weak.”
“If you fall down the ladder, you’ll be there for a while, because I’m not ready to start dragging you around.”
He laughed. “I’ll try not to.”
“I’m going to try to contact Lucas again in”—Sif glanced at the digital clock on the control panel—“fifteen minutes. I’ll be down after I get him up to speed.”
“All right.” Hunter started down the ladder, and then stopped. “Sif?”
“Yeah.”
“I meant what I said. That was some shit-hot flying. You saved both our asses.”
Sif nodded and smiled as he disappeared below. Hunter was one of the best pilots she’d ever known—sure, she gave him a fair amount of grief for being an Air Force puke, because as a naval aviator it was her duty to do so—but apart from all the professional banter, he was a good stick. Compliments like that didn’t come easy for either of them, so he must truly mean what he said.
Her dad would have been proud of what she did today. Sif hoped that wherever he was, he saw her bring her ship down safely.
“I put the hammer down today, Daddy,” Sif whispered, staring at the stars beginning to twinkle outside her window.
But if he had lived, if the drunk hadn’t crossed the center line and killed her mother and father, Deke Wagner—the larger-than-life persona known as Thor to his buddies—would be gone now regardless. Outside her window was a world where all the cities were dead, the planet dark and quiet. Sif wondered what this new world held in store for them, and if all their efforts to stay alive were only delaying the inevitable.
Everyone dies. It’s just a matter of how, and when.
Maybe they would fall victim to whatever changed Earth so drastically in just—well, they still didn’t know how many years had passed. Hunter thought less than a hundred, but they couldn’t be certain. The people would know, the ones who built the fire. They probably told stories, passed it down through the generations, about what turned the world upside down and reduced once-great cities into abandoned monuments of humanity’s achievements.
She knew what the stories would tell. We probably did it to ourselves. Like always.
It was time. She toggled the comm switch again. “Resolute, this is Beagle, come in, please.” Lucas should be in a position to receive by now.
“Resolute, this is Beagle. Lucas, can you read?”
Static.
She would soon realize there was more wrong with Beagle than a fuel pump with irreparable damage, though. The transmitter, too, was fried beyond repair.
Sif and Hunter were alive. They were home.
But without a radio—and no way to contact Lucas aboard Resolute—they were stranded.
Chapter 25
Five miles southeast of the Dak
Litsa woke after night had fallen. Her head was pounding, an after-effect of the Takers’ gas. She opened her eyes and stared up at the stars. The night was clear and quiet, deathly so. Was she knocked out the entire day?
She rose to a sitting position, cradling her head in her arms. Her mouth was dry, full of a bitter, metallic taste. She tried to spit, but couldn’t.
The Takers hit fast and hard. The first gas canister was followed by more than she could count, with barely enough time to react before people started dropping to the ground, choking on the numbing fumes.
Jarrod screamed an attack warning, but he, too, fell. Litsa held her breath and sent an arrow into the chest of the first Taker she saw. She knelt by Jarrod’s side, shook him, and then killed a Taker who tried to grab her. She plunged her knife into his throat, twisted, felt the warmth of his blood spill onto her hand, and then shoved him away. She killed a third with her bow, screaming in triumph as he fell, an arrow through his heart.
The fourth man she killed snatched her bow from her hand and threw it into the night. She strangled him with her bare hands, and then realized the battle was lost. The Takers, in their suits and gas masks, appeared as if from nowhere, and swarmed into the Dak’s entrance. There were too many.
In less than a minute, the Dak was lost.
Litsa, and a few others who did not succumb to the fast-acting gas, scattered into the darkness when the gunfire erupted, zigzagging across the terrain, running as fast as they could. She had no chance against an enemy armed with rifles and made a snap decision to survive and fight another day.
She had no idea how many were lost, but it had to be bad. The Takers struck at just the right time, when the Dak was wide open.
Her people—her family—were taken.
She pounded her fist into the dirt.
It had happened to other clans, too. A few survivors joined up with Litsa’s clan after escaping the Takers’ grasp, and their stories sounded much like what she just experienced. Their family, friends, and loved ones were torn from them, and they wandered the northern territories, alone and afraid, until they found Litsa’s people. No one knew what became of the men, women, and children who disappeared into the Takers’ damn flying machines. They were just gone.
Litsa rubbed the back of her right hand, still stained with a Taker’s lifeblood. They would pay for what they did.
First, though, Litsa had to make her way back to the Dak. There was hopefully still food there, and water. The Takers wouldn’t come back, at least not yet. They rarely returned to a location more than once, so she should be safe. The others knew that, as well, so she might find other survivors.
Litsa stood, got her bearings, and walked northwest, toward home. She wasn’t far from the point where they attacked the hive less than twenty-four hours ago.
For the first time she could remember, she felt alone.
She could still smell the metallic tang of the knockout gas as she ventured farther into the Dak, but, gladly, enough of it had dissipated that it caused no ill effects. Some of the torches had fallen to the dirt, but most were still burning, attached to the walls. She expected the inner chambers to be in disarray, but surprisingly little was disturbed, which spoke to the speed and effectiveness of the Takers’ attack.
Litsa padded from chamber to chamber, traveling deeper within the maze of tunnels in the underground labyrinth she called home. Her echoing calls went unanswered. The Dak was empty.
She had seen others running away, though. Some of them had to have escaped, as she did. But for whatever reason, th
ey hadn’t returned. The Takers couldn’t have captured everyone.
Most of the warriors were either just within the entrance, or outside, clustered around Joshua and Jarrod, and most of them were surely taken. The others who ran away were probably gatherers, craftsmen, caregivers, all too scared to return. If they didn’t, though, Litsa doubted they would survive for long.
She passed through the grand hall, where just days before she received her punishment. She stared up at the ledge where Joshua sat as the whip snapped and cut and she could no longer hold in her screams.
She cupped her hands to her mouth and shouted, “Is anyone here?” Her own voice answered her tenfold, bouncing from wall to wall.
The kitchens were nearby, and she helped herself to a cup of water—cool and soothing to her throat, ravaged by the gas. The wall greens, a staple she never loved, tasted wonderful. With each mouthful, she could feel her energy returning. She sat on the dirt floor and ate more than her usual share, not knowing how long it might be until she ate again.
She had no idea what she was going to do. She wanted vengeance, but how? No one knew where the Takers lived. They flew through the skies in their machines—some of the same machines she learned about in the old texts, the ones used to fight the Riy when the spread first began—but no one ever discovered where the machines came from. They could be anywhere.
She entered the teaching chamber, where the children spent most of their days. The old texts were there, the same books Litsa studied as a child. Stories of the before time, when the world was a different place. Before the rise of the Riy.
The books were handed down from generation to generation, treated carefully, almost reverently, as they represented a touchstone to the past, a source of knowledge, and a source of hope.
Things were good once. People lived easy lives, food lined the shelves of places called grocery stores, and no one went hungry. Machines were used for almost everything, and hardly anyone worked the fields to scrape together enough food to survive. In the winter, people lived in the buildings, where it was warm and safe. And the cities, what glorious places they were. Buildings reaching high into the sky, full of people going about their daily lives with no creatures to steal the daylight.
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