Akio scanned the chaotic scene as best he could without attracting attention. “I don’t know where she is.”
“Oh God, my baby!”
Several of the attackers, still in their vision-scrambling apparel, stood in front of The Excluded, near Lord August and JC. All toted weapons. One broad-shouldered man removed his ski mask, revealing a ruddy and handsome tanned face. “We want everything you have,” he said loudly, so as to be heard by the whole group. “Food, weapons, everything.”
“Why don’t you go and rob some corpses,” JC said.
The gang leader looked directly at JC. “Why don’t you shut up?” He then looked around at his minions, positioned in a perimeter around The Excluded. He nodded. Some of them started rifling through bags and backpacks, dumping out their contents and grabbing anything deemed useful or valuable. The women cried and the men gnashed their teeth, fuming at their humiliation. Still others didn’t move at all, lying where they had been stunned. Their arms and legs splayed out at odd angles, while unblinking eyes stared at the sky. Mothers tried desperately to revive children. Husbands wept over their wives.
“We’re all in this together,” Lord August said to the leader of the gang. “These are bad times for all of us. Let’s help each other instead.” His demeanor, as ever, was calming and gentle.
The gang leader merely laughed. “Get everything,” he instructed his cohorts. Suddenly, three deep, chest-thumping booms rolled across the landscape in rapid succession, as though an immense artillery gun had been fired far away. Everyone looked west—to the right hand side of the road. The gang stopped and looked uncertainly at their leader. “Keep going,” he said. The humiliated travelers looked at each other, perplexed. Ten seconds later, three bright lights appeared in the western sky. As people watched, they gradually grew further apart and moved lower. Then, the low rumble of rocket engine exhaust echoed across the flatlands.
Zara looked at Akio. Her face lit up. “It’s my dad! He’s come to save us!”
The volume grew and the lights got brighter. The gang could no longer ignore them. The outlines of three shuttles could now be seen, using downward rocket thrust to brake. They were still several kilometers away. The leader shouted: “Forget it! Let’s go!” The gang grabbed what they could and made for their motorcycles. The shuttles rapidly drew closer. The shock cones in their engine exhausts were now visible. Taygete came to. She looked up and saw the approaching pillars of fire, now accompanied by a deafening roar. She then saw the departing gangsters. With a quick look at her sister, she withdrew her gun, aimed it at the head of one of the nearest attackers, and fired. The shot was inaudible over the noise. He slumped to the ground. The one next to him saw it happen, and went for his gun. Before he could draw it, Taygete was pointing hers right at his head. She shook her head ‘no’. He moved his hand slowly back away from his concealed holster, dropping the stolen items he was carrying, and mounted his bike.
The air itself now shook from the roar of the shuttles’ engines as they hovered half a kilometer away. The scene was lit up as brightly as the midday sun. The gang leader didn’t wait around. He jumped on his bike, turned on the spot with a screech of his back tire, and sped off, closely followed by his lieutenants. The rank and file members clambered as quickly as they could onto their machines. Before they could get far, Blake, Thaddeus, Aimee and other Raiders shot their tires out. They spun out and went sliding across the asphalt. “God, I wish I had one of those rocket launchers!” Blake yelled over the noise. Thaddeus nodded.
Taygete dropped her gun, bent over her sister, and slapped her face frantically. “Asterope! Wake up! Wake up!” Her eyelids moved. “Come on! Come back to me!”
The three spacecraft had blunt, tapering hulls, flat undersides, and short wings that curved slightly upwards. They were now descending vertically to land on the road, 200 meters away. Panic broke out among the hapless travelers at the intense light and sound, and they began to run away. JC stood up, faced them, and made the X sign above his head with his forearms. Lord August did the same. Seeing this, others followed suit. Many of those who were running looked around, and stopped fleeing when they saw the amazing sight of their comrades’ salutes silhouetted by the white hot fire of the descending craft. Zara stood up. “Kassandra!” she yelled. She desperately began to search the chaotic melee. “Kassandra! Where are you?” She looked as though she was merely mouthing the words, as nothing could be heard over the roar. Akio headed off in the opposite direction to look for her. Ten meters away, Zara found Kassandra at the side of the road, lying on her back. She wasn’t moving. Zara crouched over her and pulled her ski mask off. Kassandra’s left cheek was badly bruised, and blood trickled from her left nostril. “Oh baby!” Zara pressed her ear to Kassandra’s chest for a few seconds. Then she looked around and yelled: “Akio! She’s over here! She’s still alive!” Akio was now far away and didn’t hear her. She turned back towards Kassandra, and slapped her left cheek a few times. “Come on, baby! Come on!” Kassandra didn’t stir. Zara kept slapping her. “Come on, baby! Oh God, please come back to me!”
The roar abruptly ceased. The silence was deafening, and it was once again nearly dark. The shuttles’ external lights then came on and illuminated the scene. Hatches in the bellies of the craft opened, forming a staircase, and people filed out quickly. Some wore orange flight suits, and others wore white medical lab coats. They ran towards the chaotic, confused group. “It’s okay!” Lord August yelled, cupping his hands to his mouth. “They’ve come to save us! Stay here!”
JC swung into action. “Blake, Thad, Aimee, get your guys to find the most seriously injured, so they can get treated first.”
“Yes sir,” they replied as one, before scurrying away.
Some of the gangsters who hadn’t got away on their bikes began to run. JC saw them. He drew his gun and aimed. Lord August grabbed his arm. “No! Absolutely not!” JC turned and glared at August. He snorted. “We’re better than that,” Lord August said.
JC exhaled slowly as he lowered his weapon. “For once I agree with you, old man.”
A lone figure descended the stairs from the middle of the three large craft. He was Asian and neatly manicured. He wore black pants, a white shirt, and a tie. The man walked along the road towards the noisy, fraught scene. Akio was the first to recognize him. “Kato-san!” He ran over and bear-hugged Kato.
“Akio! Where are Zara and Kassie?”
“I’m looking for them.” The two men then began looking together, until Kato spotted his daughter on her knees, crying, at the right hand side of the road.
“Zara!” Kato shouted. He ran over, and found the source of her pain. Zara’s arms were around Kassandra. She was unresponsive.
“Dad!” Zara shouted, on seeing him. She stood up. They hugged each other tightly.
“What the hell happened?” Kato asked.
“A gang. They were trying to rob us. Kassie’s still alive but unconscious.”
Kato turned around. “Medics! Over here! Now!”
“Yes sir!” several of them responded. They left the patients they had been examining, much to JC’s annoyance, and headed over.
The first one to arrive pulled out a tablet-sized scanner, held it a meter above Kassandra, and moved it slowly from her head to her feet. He took a deep breath. “Okay. Vitals are good. No trauma worse than a nosebleed. Slight concussion to the left side of her face. Low blood O2. Get me a mask, somebody.” One of the others rummaged in his bag, and produced a clear plastic oxygen mask. It required no cylinder, as it pulled pure oxygen from the air as needed. He fastened it to Kassandra’s face, covering her nose and mouth. The clear mask misted every few seconds as she exhaled.
Kato knelt down on the left side of the limp girl. “Come on, Kassie.” He took her hand. “Come on, my love. You can get through this.” Then he looked around, as though he had snapped out of a trace. “Doctors, go and treat the others. We only need one now. Oh, and pass the order along: as soon as they’re stabil
ized, we need to get out of here.”
“Yes, sir.” Four white coats scurried off, scanning the chaotic scene for others that needed help. There was no shortage.
The floodlights, shining from ten meters up (near the top of the shuttles’ fuselages) cast long shadows in the growing darkness. Babbling people milled about gathering and repacking belongings and locating lost family members.
----
The three shuttles’ cabins were V-shaped: only six seats wide at the front, but sixteen seats wide at the rear. The seats were as large as first class airplane seats. Each molded itself to fit its passenger. The walls and ceiling were white. The sight of dirty people with ragged clothes and unkempt hair buckling themselves in in suchv sumptuous surroundings was incongruous. There was a low hum of idling turbomachinery. Antonio, Annabelle, David, Vivianne, Kassandra, Magana and Courtney sat in a row, separated by two aisles. “Holy cow, I’ve never been so relieved in all my life,” Antonio said. The others nodded vigorously in agreement. Annabelle’s weak smiled dissolved back into grief.
Vivianne and David buckled Etienne in. The seat morphed into a protective child seat as they did so. “I didn’t like that part of our trip, no no no,” the little girl said, shaking her head.
“Me neither, sweetie,” David said. “This part’ll be better though.” Vivianne planted a kiss on her cheek. More passengers ascended the stairs. Some, still unconscious, were carried up and buckled in. Their seats, sensing their limp bodies, formed extra protrusions to protect their heads from flopping to the side in flight. Doctors sat next to them wherever possible. Kassandra was one such traveler. She was at the front. Her eyes were closed. Akio sat to her left and Zara and Kato to her right. Her physician was seated behind her. Zara’s eyes were moist. She stroked her daughter’s cheek. “She’s a brave little soul, isn’t she?”
Akio shook his head in admiration. “My gosh! I never saw this coming. Her bravery. Taygete told me she tackled someone on a bike doing forty kilometers an hour. She’s absolutely fearless!”
“I think we did something right,” Zara said.
“Yeah. But we can’t take all the credit. People grow up to be who they are in the end. All we as parents can do is nurture and guide them.”
“Ever think of having another? Well not now, I guess, with all that’s happened.” Zara’s face fell as she said the last sentence.
“I wouldn’t rule it out,” Akio said. “Nobody knows how all this is going to turn out. People will keep on having kids though. The human race isn’t going to grind to a halt.”
“Five minutes ‘till wheels up,” a voice announced over the loudspeaker. The orange flight-suited personnel hurried to help more passengers get seated and buckled. Few of them had ever flown before, much less traveled in space. Soon, all was ready. The attendants took their seats across the rear wall of the cabin.
“Lift-off in thirty seconds,” came the announcement. The cabin went quiet with anticipation. Soon, the whine in the background gave way to a roar. The shuttles rose on columns of fire in the near darkness, leaving smoking puddles of molten asphalt as they did so. Then they began to move forwards. The cabin walls turned into virtual windows. Chatter rose among the passengers as they excitedly pointed out the lights of the towns and, further away, Lyon itself. It was a giant glowing green circle. They gained altitude. Then the throaty roar of conventional rockets cut out, replaced by the much higher-pitched roar of ZPR power, the propulsion technology that had opened the whole Solar System to mankind. The ground, now two kilometers below, was illuminated brightly by the sun-like intensity of their engines. The three craft shot forward, pinning the travelers to their seats. Some wore expressions of fear, having had no idea what to expect. The craft carved a parabolic path into the sky. Six minutes later, they were clear of Earth’s atmosphere and still accelerating. Everything outside was black, as they were flying east across the night side of the planet. The flyers looked out at clearer stars than most of them had ever seen.
Soon, the shuttles’ engines shut down and they began to coast. They were weightless; another first for almost everybody. Forty minutes later, bands of pink, blue and then fiery orange spread out rapidly in an arc in front of the shuttles. Then the shining orb that powered all life on Earth poked above the horizon, casting blinding rays into the cabins that caused the passengers to shield their eyes. Those whose eyes still couldn’t stand even regular daylight wore dark glasses. The deep blue of the Pacific Ocean was below them. “ETA seventy-five minutes,” the cabin loudspeaker said. Antonio, Annabelle, David, Etienne, Vivianne and Courtney all held hands. Their faces shone with joy and relief.
“Kassie told me her grandpa’s spaceship is amazing,” Annabelle said.
“It had better have showers on board,” Vivianne said.
Having negotiated the weightless corridors of ISI’s orbital transport interchange with much assistance from the crew, all the members of The Excluded were now in full Earth gravity once again in the opulent surroundings of the Revenant. The three hundred people stood and sat in the bridge, first class lounge, and corridors, awaiting assignment to rooms. Staff, both human and robotic, scurried about, serving them piping hot fine cuisine on white china plates. The bridge, a large circular room, now had its seats arranged in a circle. Kato, Korolev, JC, Lord August, Akio, Zara, Annabelle, and everyone else in Kassandra’s inner circle were eating together. Kassandra and the other victims of e-bombs and stun batons were being cared for in the ship’s sick bay. (This only had six beds, so nearby suites had been packed with beds and turned into makeshift wards for the other forty-five patients.)
“I’m praying for her every second,” Zara said between mouthfuls of steak.
“Me too,” Akio said. There was little other chatter as the starving refugees satiated themselves. Zara set her plate down on her seat, her meal half-eaten, and made the 110-meter trek to be by Kassandra’s side. She entered the white, sterile-looking sick bay. Kassandra laid there. Her eyes were still closed, but her face had been washed. A silver probe, extending from the wall, was six inches from her skull.
“Her brain activity is increasing,” the ship’s doctor told Zara. It shouldn’t be long now.”
Zara nodded. “Okay. Thanks, doctor.” She pulled up a chair by the right hand side of Kassandra’s bed. She took Kassandra’s hand, and watched her daughter’s serene face intently.
Five minutes later, Akio walked in. He went to the left side of her bed. After looking at Kassandra for a long moment and stroking her cheek, he asked: “How’s she doing?”
“Doctor says it won’t be long.” Akio pulled up a chair and sat down, holding Kassandra’s other hand. “I’m so proud of her,” he said.
Zara sighed and nodded. “Me too.”
Two minutes later, Kassandra’s eyelids began to quiver. Her eyes opened, and she blinked a few times. “Where am I?” she asked, looking up at the featureless white ceiling.
“Oh baby, you’re back!” Zara flung her arms around Kassandra. Kato held her hand, and beamed with joy.
“Did we win?” Kassandra asked.
“What? Oh, yeah, the bandits,” Zara said. “Yes we did, baby. Yes we did.”
“Are we in space?”
“Yes, we’re on the Revenant.”
Kassandra raised her head and looked around. “Where is everybody?”
“They’re all here,” Akio said. “They’re in other parts of the ship.”
“Everybody?”
“Yes. Your grandpa sent three shuttles to pick us up.”
“So we’re out of danger?”
“Yes we are,” Zara said, brushing her hair out of her face.
The doctor walked over. “Excellent! Welcome back, Miss Nishimura.”
“Can I have something to eat?”
“Of course!” The doctor silently summoned food service. Two minutes later, a smiling butler brought a plate of food. Kassandra sat up and began to eat shrimp stir fry. All was quiet for a few minutes, as the doctors attended t
o the other patients. The lady in the bed to the left of Kassandra began to come around.
“I never thought I’d eat good food again,” Kassandra said.
“I bet,” Akio said.
“What’s happening now? Are we all going somewhere?”
“No. I think we’re going to rest and recuperate,” Zara said. “Nobody knows what our next move is going to be yet.”
“I’m thankful to be out of the reach of that dreadful switch thing,” Akio said.
“Me too.”
“Where are we sleeping?” Kassandra asked.
“Your grandpa’s put us in a suite,” Zara said.
“And the others?”
“Split between first and second class, wherever there’s room, I think.”
“Good thing there was room on the ship,” Akio said. “I think she accommodates about eight hundred.”
The door slid open, and Lord August entered. “Kassandra! So glad you’re back with us!” he said is his usual kindly, gentle manner. His eyes twinkled.
“Thanks,” Kassandra said.
The Extinction Switch: Book three of the Kato's War series Page 24