Charles Sheffield - Aftermath

“We don’t know where we are. I am not from this part of the country, and the last step of the return to Earth was not as we had planned it. We landed somewhere in the northeastern United States, that I am sure, but I could not tell you where within a hundred kilometers. Where are we? And where will we be going?”

Eli turned to wood again. “I don’t believe I oughta answer that question, ’cept to say you’ll travel to the headquarters of the Legion. If the leader permits, you may ask questions. If she chooses, she may decide to answer.”

“How should I address her? Doesn’t she have a name, other than just being your leader?”

“If the leader permits, you may ask her name.”

And if she chooses, she may decide to tell me. We already went through that one. Celine was fishing again — and getting nowhere. If she couldn’t do better than this, she ought to hand over to one of the others.

“We are ready to go,” she said. Delay would do nothing but make them more tired, and she was beginning to feel giddy and nauseated. They were long overdue for food and sleep. The members of the Mars expedition had been chosen for cast-iron stomachs and physical stamina, but there were limits. “We all need rest.”

“After you meet with our leader.”

“When will that be?”

“Right soon. We’re heading there at once.”

Celine expected to be told to return to the vehicles. Instead, Eli motioned them forward. At the rear of the barn a wooden trapdoor had been lifted. An iron ladder descended from it. Wilmer followed a woman with a shotgun, climbing down backward but turning his head to see where he was going. Reza and Jenny went after him.

Celine stood on the brink, staring down. The ladder was not a long one, it had nine or ten steps and ended in a narrow space lit by hanging lanterns. The walls and floor, all that she could see of them, were dark-stained wooden boards. Celine smelled creosote, turpentine, and moldering earth.

“Don’t just stand there, lady.” Eli spoke from close behind her. “Git on down.”

Had it all been a lie? Eli had made his own feelings clear. He would kill them gladly. And the space below more resembled a grave than a meeting place with the Legion’s leader. For all Celine knew, the command had been “Get rid of them — at once.”

With the gun at her back, Celine had no choice.

She took a deep breath and climbed down the ladder.

Celine found herself not in a room but a tunnel, running away in front of her in a long arc until it curved out of sight to the left. The roof, like the walls and floor, was timber, heavily braced every twenty yards. Lanterns, located at the braces, did not use the oil that their appearance suggested. Their light came from electricity, carried by power lines looped to brackets on the walls.

Celine turned to Eli, who had arrived at the foot of the ladder. “I said that we need rest, but maybe I didn’t put it strongly enough. I don’t think you realize what my crew has been through. For the past six years, we have never lived in a gravitational field as strong as that of Earth for more than a few minutes at a time. Our bodies are exhausted. It is impossible for us to walk six kilometers — or even one kilometer — before we have had food and sleep.”

“Did I say you’d have to do that?” Eli gestured ahead. “The leader knew, just like she knew about the supernova without bein’ told. She said you’d be tired. You don’t have to walk six kilometers, not even one. Think you can manage fifty yards?”

“Yes.”

“That’s all I’m asking. After that it’s comfort city. See ’em yet?”

Celine saw them. Steel rails three feet apart, with wooden sleepers between, began at a buffer in the middle of the tunnel. Two cars, five feet wide and ten feet long, sat on the rails.

“Runs straight to headquarters,” Eli said. “Electric power, or hand-pumping if you want or need it. We’ll use the ’lectric today. The leader told me to get you to her in good condition. It’s better than defilers deserve, but it’s orders.” He motioned to Reza and Jenny, who were already standing by the cars. “On board.”

The cars were open, their bodies formed from a single piece of molded graphite composite. The seats seemed at first of the same material, but they were soft to the touch and gave luxuriously under Celine’s weight. She settled back with a sigh. Five minutes of this much comfort, and it would be hard to remain awake. The only car controls that she could see were two foot pedals in front of Eli. She looked around. Wilmer and Celine sat right behind Eli, with Reza and Jenny behind them. Two uniformed women at the back rode shotgun — literally. Their weapons were old-fashioned, but armed and ready.

Eli pressed the right pedal and the car moved forward with a steady surge of acceleration. When the speed leveled off they were probably moving at no more than twenty miles an hour, but the low roof and uncertain light made it seem to Celine that the dark board walls flashed past at monstrous speed. The tunnel had become almost straight, descending steadily. She tried to estimate the gradient. Even if it were as little as one in fifty, six kilometers of this would plunge them a thousand feet underground — more than enough to shield completely from the gamma pulse. With the rest of Earth devastated, the technology of this mole group might have come through unscathed.

Reza leaned over Celine’s shoulder. “I don’t understand what’s going on here,” he said loudly. “There’s no way that all this could have been built after Supernova Alpha hit. This place must be ten years old at least.”

Maybe Jenny hadn’t delivered Celine’s order to remain silent, or maybe Reza in his present strange state had misunderstood. It made no difference, because Eli was turning eagerly in his seat to face them.

“Old? It sure is! We’ve been buildin’ here for twenty year an’ more. We knew it was comin’!”

“You knew about the supernova?” Wilmer asked. “You predicted it. How?”

“Why, it was prophesied. In the leader’s writings, long before she was a martyr to the cause. She knew. She said the supernova would come, and we would go from strength to strength. We have, and we will.” Eli’s face was alive with rare excitement. “ ’You must continue the labor, as we have labored together for fifteen years. In this dark hour, take comfort. Do not fear for me, nor grieve at my leaving. Labor on. Very soon, within this mortal lifetime, I will return to you.’ “

Celine hoped that the others would know enough to keep quiet. Reza and Wilmer, unknowing, had found the button that worked for Eli and the Legion of Argos: evangelical zeal.

“ ’Before the second prophecies of the Eye of God, there will be certain proof that my resurrection is imminent.’ “ The voices of the two women added to Eli’s, in a slow, chanted litany that echoed along the dark tunnel. “ ’There will be portents. When these signs appear, prepare for my return: Another sun will rise in the southern sky, turning night into day. Winter will become summer. Heat will draw from the seas the poison fogs of contagion, dropping their pestilence on the land. Fire and floods will sweep away nations and powers and principalities. Hot winds will scourge the face of Earth, scattering it like dust across the whole world. Lightning from afar will shatter the false temples of Mammon and destroy the fools who seek to defile the face of Heaven. In that same hour, as the trappings of false governance are broken, you will come to me. I will rise again, as our star rises. The Eye of God will prophesy, and the holy work of cleansing our nation and our world will begin. This time there will be no turning back, no quarter given.’ “