Twilight Earth (7 page)

‘Chem’ is used to denote the use of chemical weapons. Numerical code designates percentage of lethality. Zero-zero is one hundred percent, zero-one is ninety percent, zero-two is eighty percent, and so on. Alphabetical code designates proximity to local surface marker. Alpha is less than a kilometer; beta is between one and two kilometers, etc. No alpha designator indicates detection at another installation.

“You should ask the fucking thing how we’re supposed to get back to the damn surface!” Jon said angrily.

“Jon!
Language!
The girls can hear you!” Ellie said, scolding her husband.

Jon tried to look sheepish. “Sorry Ell, I guess I’m just frustrated. Billions of people are dying up there and I can’t help them!"

“I think that’s the point, Jon. I understand how you feel and I’m sorry for it. But I believe the job on the surface has fallen to your brethren and the care of us has fallen to you. I know it may not seem fair; but if the human race is to have a future, we’re going to need skilled professionals like you,” Ben replied, calming the doctor.

Jon looked at Ben in confusion. “I think there is more of Tom in you than any of us knows. He would have told me exactly that sort of thing to put me at ease. Thank you, Ben.”

“Well, now that we all know the bad news and we’re scared to death. I think we should get the girls home just in case they upgrade to condition three,” Ellie said. "It’s getting kinda late anyway.”

Jon agreed and shortly the small family left for the short walk back to their apartment.

After everyone had left, the small family sat back down in the living room. “What do you think is going on up there right now?” Kaitlin asked softly.

Ben moved over to sit next to her and put his arm around her. “Try not to think about it,

Sweetheart.”

About then, the pod stopped moving. Shortly after that, a soft rumbling could be heard along with the shaking of the pod as the shaft above it collapsed, sealing them in.

––––––––

It was an uneasy night for the Bedouin family. They all shared one bed for comfort, making their family bond grow even deeper. By the next morning, tension was building quickly. Most news sources had stopped broadcasting, or were no longer able to keep people informed. Ben felt the need to try to comfort at least his fellow pod-mates. So he had the main terminal in his living room ask everyone to meet him in the park for a ‘town meeting’ and to bring a picnic lunch.

Deirdre and the girls thought it was a grand idea and changed into sundresses while Ben got busy making up the lunch. Jorga felt weird wearing a sundress, so she put on a pair of denim shorts, and a tank top.

Most of the people in the pod responded to Ben’s message and showed up in the park ready for a picnic. With a little help from Marcy, everyone heard his voice whether they had come or not.

“Folks, I know news from the surface is getting, at best, spotty. I also know that all of us left someone we know or care about up there. It’s even harder to know that they are probably dying or at the very least fighting for their lives while we sit down here and do nothing. As hard as it is to accept, we have to.

“The whole reason we’re down here to begin with is to insure that the human race survives what’s happening to it. Although it may seem cowardly, think of this as our part of the fight, or perhaps more accurately, as our lifeboat.

“Now, I know it may sound like playing the fiddle while Rome burns, but I suggested we all have a picnic lunch so we can talk and get to know one another. In order for this to work, we are going to need to trust and respect each other. We need to start on that now." He paused and turned to the closest person and held out his hand. "Good afternoon, my name is Ben Bedouin."

Jon’s wife, Ellie happened to be the person, and she immediately caught on to his ploy. She took his hand and introduced herself. “Good afternoon, Ben, I’m Ellie Lyam. It's a pleasure to meet you.”

As he’d intended, the rest of the people also began introducing themselves, and relaxing. As the afternoon progressed, more people came to the park, and joined the picnic.

Later that night, when the notification came for condition three, the residents of the pod were more accepting of what was about to happen to them. None of them wanted to go into the stasis chambers, but there were no problems getting them to go in either. So after a moment of silence for the massive loss of life that had brought them this situation, Ben verified that everyone had indeed entered the chambers before doing so himself.

He found that it unnerved him to see all those people in the small glass coffins of the chambers. It especially bothered him to see Deirdre, Jorga, Kaitlin and Marcy in them. With a deep breath, he lay back in his own chamber and pulled the door closed.

––––––––

Waking up was a slow, disjointed process. The first thing he noticed was the cold. It was weird, he felt like he’d been outside in the winter, naked, and just came back inside. Ben noticed that he couldn’t see through the door of his chamber anymore, so he had to assume he’d been out for some time.

Checking the panel for a reading outside the chamber, he saw that it was safe for him to open the door. According to the instructions the pod doctor, in this case Jon, would also be waking up. It would be his job to make sure everyone was still okay while Ben checked on the outside world. They were the only two that would be waking up for now. If the world above was still in trouble, Jon and Ben would get back in the chambers for a thousand-year sleep. Something Ben wasn’t in a hurry to do.

While he’d been sleeping, another experimental project went to work to teach him while in cryo-sleep. Ben thought it odd that they would even attempt such a thing, but they must have, because he now knew how to access the surface sensors from his terminal, as well as a bunch of other stuff he hadn't known before going into the chambers.

He climbed out of his chamber and grabbed a jumpsuit before heading out to find the doctor. Jon and his family had been assigned the bay next to his, so Ben knocked politely before going in.

“Come in, Ben. You know, I’m happy as a clam that these ‘coffins’ work, but waking up is a real mother,” Jon said. “Do you think we slept the full two-hundred-fifty years?”

“That was the plan, no matter how strange that question sounds,” Ben chuckled. “You about ready to get started?”

Jon nodded. “But before you run off, let me take a look at you. If these damn machines have any adverse side effects, I’d like to know.”

The two men walked to the small medical area, which was just off of the chamber ‘hall’. Jon had Ben take his jumpsuit back off for the examination. While Ben stripped, Jon got them both coffees from the medical replicator.

After a no-nonsense and very thorough physical, (including blood and urine samples) Jon pronounced him healthy and kicked him out of the small medical area so he could get busy checking the systems of all the hibernators. Ben headed for his office that was near his apartment to begin his checks.

After the first half-hour, he knew that they would be going back into the chambers. Two hundred and fifty years had indeed passed. All the new and experimental equipment that had been installed in the pods seemed to be working perfectly. That, however, was the extent of the good news.

Accessing the log files from the closest military base almost reduced Ben to tears, but he needed the information stored there. Listening to the calm voice of the commanding officer and then his replacement and her replacement, brought home to Ben just how many and how hard those left behind died.

“Friday, April twenty-first. Brigadier General William Rice, Commander American-Pacific Defense Forces. Guardian Shield Main Marine Depot, Leavenworth, Kansas, United States.

“At zero-one-twenty-five this morning, the approaching fleet began its attack by taking out most of our satellites, then beginning a massive orbital bombardment. In the first hour of this war, most of the major cities of Asia and Europe have been destroyed with nuclear weapons. The progression of the attack is moving faster than our orbital rotation, indicating that more ships are joining the attack as they arrive in orbit. The destruction has been massive, but not total. We have received reports that there are survivors in isolated groups. While very powerful, their weapons are not killing everyone.

“A note about those weapons; my geeks are telling me they don’t think those were normal nukes. Although the destructive force was in the hundred-plus megaton range, the residual radiation is far, far lower than it should be. They believe that the area will be safe for habitation within a year. Dr. Thorenson believes they might have been using anti-matter, but the rest of the Geeks seem widely divided on that.

“The Invaders are also using high powered beam weapons, again fired from low orbit, against the shallow, and hardened bunkers. Early intel is telling us that they are skipping about half of the shallow bunkers.

“This could mean one of two things; they lack the ability to detect the underground facilities, or (we feel this is more likely) they are intentionally leaving those bunkers alone. What they want with us can’t even be guessed at this point, but we're hoping they’re planning on taking slaves.

“Counter to the belief that they are intentionally skipping the Bunkers, is the fact that they seem to be using chemical weapons as well. We have reports of people near the attack sites simply collapsing into a coma. Again, the Geeks are working on it, but as with all things, it takes time we don’t have.

“Command launched our ICBMs and nuclear tipped Pegasus missiles against the enemy in orbit, but the missiles and the bombers were shot down. Those missiles that did manage to get through, encountered some sort of defensive shield covering the hulls of the enemy ships. They detonated, but failed to do significant damage.

“A few moments ago, Intel reported to me that indications are that the enemy is preparing to deploy on the planet. This information comes to me from Command, along with the order not to engage. I don’t understand the order, but I will obey it. I’ve sent a query back to Command and as a precautionary measure, ordered my forces to stand-by.”

Ben skimmed through the reports and logs, noticing that there seemed to be a huge database of information. That was when the last log file got his attention. The voice was of a very young-sounding girl.

“Marsch thirty-second, year seventeen, Deri Meril, Recorder. In the wake of the last attack, the count is only two hundred twenty thousand remaining. The Council has ordered full evacuation. Even though the Sal'andori and the Lizards have left, the planet isn’t for us anymore.

“Handed down from Master to Prentice since the year one; we’ve been told to finish the last message so:

“’Bedouin travelers, Sal'andori know about you and will be waiting at your first stop. Take the long ride for safety, good luck and may all the gods and Goddesses watch over all of you.’

“This is the final entry for the Guardian. I am leaving for my ship from here. If anyone ever finds this record, know that the human race has abandoned Earth so she can heal. Perhaps, one day, our mother will forgive us and once again welcome us home.”

––––––––

Swallowing past the lump in his throat, Ben tried to access the satellite feed, but wasn’t surprised when it failed. So he accessed the stored data from it, and had better luck.

Although the bombardment didn’t yield a lot of radiation, it still threw a tremendous amount of dust into the air; enough that it triggered a nuclear winter. From there the ecological situation got bad.

A massive tectonic event had been building along the eastern Pacific Rim and the bombing of Honolulu, Seattle, Portland, and all the major cities of California ended up doing far more damage than intended.

The damage to the pod network was frightening. The earthquakes severed ground communications and collapsed the transport tubes, but telemetry said that with the exception of the mid-pacific pods, the rest of the pods were still intact and functioning.

Pulling up the remote telemetry screen, Ben saw that the former west coast was back in the network, except for the six large pods in Hawaii; they had red X’s behind them indicating that they’d been destroyed. Sixty thousand lives had been ended while they slept due to the eruption of the volcano that had formed the Hawaiian atoll.

Going back to the stored data from the satellite, it confirmed the complete destruction of the Hawaiian Islands.

Similar issues had developed all over the rest of the planet, but none of the other pods were listed as destroyed. Currently, the network reported that it was complete and functional. Apparently the repair robots were working very well.

The words ‘polar shift’ caught his eye then, and he quickly skipped to that part. The data didn’t say why, but roughly nine years after the initial attack, the planet once again moved the poles. Looking at pictures of the planet didn’t help; it was completely covered by clouds.

It hadn’t really shifted much, which was why the satellite had been able to stay in orbit. But the North Pole was now in the center of what used to be the Russia. None of their maps were really valid anymore since the east coast had dropped under the ocean and the earthquakes and volcanic eruptions had done pretty much the same to the west coast.

Most importantly, right now, most of the planet was in a minor ice age. Ben only hoped it would be habitable when they once again awoke.

Cleaning up the remnants of the meal he’d been unable to finish, Ben made his way back down to the medical bay.

“I was about to come looking for you,” Jon said. “I’ve lost the data feeds from the Hawaiian pods.”

Ben nodded sadly. “That’s because Hawaii no longer exists.”

“No! That’s not even possible is it?” Jon asked.

“Yeah, it is. Between the bombing, Mauna Loa and the earthquakes, it’s just... gone.”

“How bad is it?” Jon asked.

Ben snorted. “We’re going back into the freezers. That’s how bad it is. The war is over; we lost, but it also left the planet in an ice age. Even if we all woke up now, we’d need to stay down here. Besides, someone left a warning that the enemy knows about us and they’re most likely waiting for us.”