Ashes, Ashes: The Chronicles of Altor, page 28
“Did you say General Steele, son?” Colonel Brandt asked. “Is that John Steele?”
“Yessir, one and the same.”
“Mighty good man. I wondered where he’d gone after he left the service.”
“So, the question is, where can we drop all this stuff off? We’d like to get back home.”
* * *
As with so many things, Janus proved to be prophetic about this small valley. Where once the Financial District of New York or Silicon Valley in Northern California reigned over aspects of the world, what became known as New Covington did the same.
It didn’t happen all at once. But with the coming together of the people of New City, the new fort of the United States Army that Colonel Brandt opened there, and the heavy equipment and critical supplies that Janus sent, it had a leg up over anywhere else.
The natural gas pipeline that fed into the fuel processing plant was repaired, and the plant began to function normally. Eventually, the team that had repaired it moved to other areas to spread their knowledge.
It took longer to get the dam repaired and the power plant operating, but the following summer, the god of electricity flowed once again.
June got her wall around the city. When the Army sent for tanks and drones, New Covington became impenetrable. It was hard to say which made her happier—the fact that they were now secure, or when Ric and Sylvie fell in love and made her a grandmother. They had a son and named him Kane.
Chapter Forty-Three
Into the Dome
Like children waiting to go to Disneyland, Marshall, Steele, and the Armstrongs were gathered at the front gate of Dust City early.
Marshall and Steele had held one last farewell meeting with Dani and Levi over breakfast. Janus had asked them to come up with a number of people who could drive big rigs. It wanted to send the equipment up to New City as soon as possible. It did also point out that there were at least five properly skilled over-the-road truck drivers in the group it had sent with the Prudent Twins. It seemed a little smug about that.
Dani was perfectly connected to find the remaining drivers that would be needed, so that made a good segue into the transfer of power. Marshall and Steele didn’t have any bags to take with them. They had arrived with nothing and would be leaving with almost the same. Marshall had his tablet with him, but that always seemed to be true.
Deon and Nia Armstrong did have something small to bring with them. They had taken a few mementos with them from home—a thumb drive with all their family photos and a recipe box that had all of Nia’s mother’s handwritten recipes. It wasn’t much, but it was more than most people got to bring into Altor with them.
An electric transport vehicle pulled up to the gate. There were two people in the front seats—Myla Harrison was driving and Quinn Starkweather sat in the passenger seat.
Steele frowned. “There is no way in hell I would have authorized the two of you to expose yourself to danger to come get us.”
Harrison smiled. She was already prepared for this dressing down from Steele. “And you are now in charge of Altor Security and Defense, General. You can bust me down to storeroom clerk if you’d like.”
Quinn jumped out and ran to Marshall, wrapping him in a tight hug. A moment later, he stood back and said, “Well, at least you’re not too skinny. They must be feeding you okay over here.”
“There are extra calories in the dirt and dust we eat every day,” Marshall answered with a grin that quickly faded. “I know you say it won’t be a problem, but I feel awful that you’ve just been exposed to The Shivers.”
“Yep. That was inevitable. Janus has it all under control. Let’s get back to the dome before I start defecating in my pants.”
“If you’re lucky, you’re defecating in your pants,” Marshall said.
“Boys,” Nia said, raising one eyebrow. “That’s enough of that talk.”
“Yes, ma’am,” both Quinn and Marshall said together, abashed.
Deon laughed a little and said, “You’ve still got it, Mama.”
The trip across the desert was short, but they didn’t head toward the front entrance. They drove around the south end of the dome, then continued on for another few miles.
“Really stuck it out here, huh?” Marshall asked.
“Didn’t want to make it easy for any non-friendlies to find their way in,” Quinn confirmed. “Do you remember that really old show we used to watch at my house? Get Smart?”
Marshall searched his memory then nodded. “Right. Really terrible show about spies or something?”
“Terrible is a value judgment I wouldn’t make, but yes. At the beginning of the show, there were all these sliding doors that someone had to go through to get inside. I’ve had Janus dial up the same thing for us here. They’re being installed right now.”
When the transport stopped in front of a tall rock formation, the Armstrongs looked around, slightly puzzled. “Do we need to walk to the tunnel from here?”
“Nope,” Quinn said. “We’re here.”
The rock formation wavered, then disappeared. In its place was a broad tunnel that led down at a slight angle.
Harrison pressed on the accelerator again, and they dropped down into the tunnel. When they passed from the daylight and into the dark, there was a small welcoming committee waiting for them.
Shaquem and Shaquille Armstrong stood beside a smaller electric transport vehicle. Their smiles were wide and for the first time Quinn could remember, they looked nervous.
Nia jumped out and ran to her sons. She wrapped them in a bear hug and held them for a long minute. Deon caught up and said, “Come on, Mama Bear, let me in there for a little of that.”
She loosened the hug just enough to make it four-sided.
“I don’t think we’re needed here anymore,” Harrison said and accelerated toward the dome. Just a few minutes later, they arrived at the spot where the tunnel began under the dome.
Steele climbed out of the transport and said, “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a reunion of my own waiting above. It may not be quite as enthusiastic as what we’ve just witnessed, but I’m looking forward to it, nonetheless.” He hurried off to the elevator and up to his wife, who he hadn’t seen in almost two years.
“Marshall, do you want to go up to your place, or shall we have a meeting first?”
“No one is waiting for me other than you, enthusiastic or otherwise,” Marshall answered. “Let’s have a short meeting, then I can go to work.”
“Would you like me to attend?” Harrison asked.
“No need. Thank you for the lift, Myla. I know you’ve got a lot to attend to.”
“I do. I’m sure the General will take over soon, but right now I seem to be the human liaison with Janus for this raid on the compound in Utah. I have things to do to get ready for that.”
Two minutes later, the two old friends were in Quinn’s office. He had left it as the hobbit hole from Lord of the Rings again, so that’s what they walked into.
“Some things never change, eh?” Marshall asked.
“And some things do.”
“Right,” Marshall said. “Last time we sat together in here, we were still operating under the illusion that we were in charge.”
“Now we know better.” Quinn paused, then said, “When will I start to feel symptoms of this virus?”
“If it follows form, it won’t be long. You’ll either be spending a lot of time on the porcelain princess, or you’ll be burning up with fever. I hope this thing that Janus has mixed up works.”
Quinn reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a small white bottle. “This is the miracle cure, supposedly. As soon as I feel symptomatic, two sniffs of this, and I should be all better.” He paused and looked around. “Unless, of course, Janus is using this as a shortcut to kill me as well. In which case, it’s been nice knowing you.”
“I would suggest that we try to get that stuff out to the rest of the world, but I think everyone not in this dome has already rolled the dice on it.”
They stared at each other in silence, wanting to discuss the elephant in the room, but not with the elephant listening in.
Quinn stood and stretched, then said, “Well, I guess I should get about the business of becoming deathly ill, so I can take this damn antidote.” As innocuously as possible, he leaned toward Marshall until his mouth was right next to his ear. As quietly as possible, nearly inaudibly, he said, “I’ve got a place where we can meet. Tomorrow.” He was afraid that he had been a bit too circumspect to try to avoid Janus and that Marshall didn’t understand.
Marshall stood and said, “Have you saved my apartment and office for me all this time, or did you sublet it?” He met Quinn’s eye and gave the tiniest possible nod of acknowledgement.
Casually, Quinn said, “Your apartment is waiting for you. After you get some rest and get settled in, let’s meet again. You want to set that up with Steele and Harrison?”
“I’m on it. Let’s see, you should have caught The Shivers and be all better by what, 10 a.m. tomorrow?”
“With any luck at all.”
Marshall walked out of what appeared to be the round entrance to the hobbit hole, leaving Quinn alone.
He sat down, suddenly exhausted and a little feverish.
* * *
The Shivers spread through Altor just as it had every other populated area. Twenty-four hours after Steele, Marshall, and the Armstrongs had entered the dome, the virus had spread to over eighty percent of the occupants. Virtually all of the remaining twenty percent would contract it in the next two days.
The one exception was Stella Bullitt, who was the voice of Altor. She read the news of the day on the Altor podcast and did other public service announcements. When she learned that the plan was for everyone to catch and then be cured of the virus, she decided not to participate. She announced that she could do her job just fine from her apartment and that she intended to never have contact with another human being in this lifetime.
As things turned out, that was a good strategy, but not an entirely viable one. As prevalent as robots had become in Altor, things were still touched by human hands. The Shivers virus was hardy and survived even on cold metal delivery trays.
Stella was, sadly, one of the hundreds of people who died from The Shivers inside the dome.
Quinn got feverish—which meant that he would have been part of the unlucky sixty percent who perished without the nasal spray Janus had made. As it was, he inhaled his medicine and within an hour began to feel better. Within three hours, it was as though he’d never had it.
That was true for approximately ninety percent of the population of Altor. That other ten percent? They went through the normal routine that people did who caught the virus. They either became hellishly sick with diarrhea and an unbearable headache, or they became so feverish that they died.
When the first few people died, Quinn thought that it must surely be a fluke. He postponed his planned meeting with Marshall, Steele, and Harrison where he intended to talk as privately as possible about Janus. Instead, the same foursome met in his office.
“What’s the latest?” Quinn asked.
Marshall looked at his tablet. “More than two hundred dead already.”
“It’s only been a little over twenty-four hours since the virus was introduced. Isn’t that awfully fast?”
“It is,” Marshall answered. “In Dust City, it was taking people a week or more to die.”
“Do we think the virus has mutated?” Quinn asked.
Blank looks all around.
“Janus?”
“Yes?”
“Has the virus mutated? I thought this medicated spray should have been a hundred percent successful, or very close to it.”
“The virus has not mutated. The medication is working just as it should. It’s efficacy has been one hundred percent successful.”
Quinn and Marshall looked at each other with narrowed eyes. The answer seemed to be right there, but was eluding them.
“Okaaaay,” Quinn said. “The virus is unchanged, and the medicine is working as it’s supposed to. So...” he trailed off for a moment, then a horrible idea came to him.
“Did you deliver the same medication to everyone?”
On the screens all around the room, Janus’s nearly human face appeared. It was smiling, which sent a chill down everyone’s spine.
“Very good. This human intuition can, at least occasionally, be impressive. I did not give everyone the same medicine. Do you recall how I gave certain couples ineffective birth control medication?”
Steele, Marshall, and Harrison all looked shocked. Quinn held his hand up to quell that reaction. He had to get to the bottom of this.
“I do. And I asked you to never do that again.” That wasn’t quite true. He had told Janus to never do that again. That had been in the halcyon days when he felt like he could order it to do something.
“And I haven’t. But there were some people in the dome who simply weren’t needed anymore. I brought them in for very specific purposes. Now, they have either fulfilled that purpose or showed that they would not do so. In any case, they were no longer of any use to Altor.”
“So you killed them?” Steele asked, going red in the face.
“No, I allowed approximately ten percent of them to get the virus widely known as The Shivers. That gave them, based on current survivability rates, a thirty-nine percent chance of living. If they survived, I would once again work with them to try to make them into productive members of our society.”
The four humans in the room sat silently, stunned.
Marshall quickly did the math. There were nine thousand plus people in the dome. Ten percent of that meant that nine hundred people would get sick. If the odds held, more than five hundred people would die.
And Janus had done it casually, with no apparent regret.
“One last question. The illness seems to be stronger, faster. But you say the virus hasn’t mutated. What’s happening?”
“I didn’t see any use in wasting time. For those people who didn’t get the needed medicine, I did include something that would accelerate the path of the virus. I’m not a monster.”
Quinn blinked, looked around the room and blinked again. His hands were shaking. Tears formed in his eyes. He knew his biometric readings were going crazy and he didn’t care. “Thank you, Janus.”
He turned to Marshall and said, “Will you spearhead our reaction to this? It is going to overwhelm our small hospital ward, so we’ll need to set up a new ward or treat people in their apartments.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Let’s get through this,” Quinn said, “then it’s more crucial than ever that we meet again to discuss other things.”
Chapter Forty-Four
Conspiracy
Life was terrible in Altor for the next few days.
Paradise had reigned, at least on the surface, for the previous two years.
Outside, a war, an apocalypse, and a viral plague had raged. Untold millions of people had died horrifying, fear-filled deaths by violence and disease.
Inside, there had been concerts in the park and robot servants that delivered whatever you wanted to your climate-controlled room. Virtually every type of entertainment was available on request.
Then the tunnel was finished and the plague came inside. Those who ran Altor thought they were prepared for it, and they were, to a degree. But that degree was controlled by Janus and the sentient machine looked at the world differently than humans.
It wasn’t as awful in the dome as it had been while The Shivers swept through Longbaugh Free Prison, Dust City, or New City. In each of those locations, there had only been one healthy person to try and care for the dozens or even hundreds of sick and dying. In Altor, there were plenty of healthy people to care for those who suffered.
Even so, the abrupt change from living in what had come to be accepted as Eden to their present circumstances was difficult.
Difficult for the caregivers, who had been virtually idle for two years, as Janus had taken over nearly all medical concerns.
Difficult for the brain trust of Altor, who had believed that they had the situation under control.
And of course, difficult for both the dying and those who couldn’t be more than five or ten feet from their toilet.
Quinn sent a memo out to all caregivers that when those who suffered from the fever asked for it, they should be helped along toward the inevitable with a friendly overdose.
Three days after outsiders entered the dome for the first time, The Shivers had run its course. Those who were going to die had done so. Those who were going to survive were weak and laid up in bed, but as Janus had noted, none of them were critical to the operation of Altor anyway. While they were disabled, they were not really missed.
On the fourth day, Steele, Marshall, and Harrison met in Quinn’s office. Individually, they had all thought about possible solutions, but only one of them had even the shadow of an idea.
They arrived one at a time and sat in silence waiting for the last person to arrive. Knowing Janus was undoubtedly listening, there seemed to be nothing to say beyond empty greetings. They had all seen the loss of lives and body bags being carried from the apartment buildings to the freight elevators that went into the depths of Altor.
Marshall was the last to arrive and came in with a mumbled, “Sorry.”
Quinn tightened his lips and stared at each of them in turn. Without a word, he stood and walked out of the office. He didn’t bother to say, “Follow me,” or “Come this way,” but everyone did anyway.
The quartet walked out of the office, through the storage crates, past the area where, until recently, the heavy equipment that was now in New Covington had been stored. Soon, they came to the entrance of the tunnel.
Still without speaking, Quinn led them down the tunnel. As he had mentioned, there were workers installing sliding doors made of varying materials. If someone did see through the exterior of the tunnel, they would have a difficult time fighting their way into Altor itself. Various weapons were also being installed in the tunnel walls every few feet.
