Warrior Chronicles 1: Warrior's Scar Read online

Sköll did not like the darkness. Fortunately it only lasted a few seconds. Alpha made the light again. But he didn’t open the room.

  Cort set the graviton free. Actually he started the motion to release it before the event. He couldn’t count on his muscles working outside of the time stream, so he started pulling the handle as the timer hit zero. A moment of feeling absolutely nothing. Nothing at all. But somehow he knew the moment passed. Then he felt gravity again.

  He found the locator beacon right where Barr had said it would be, and tore it apart. He then grabbed an MP5 and charged it. Petting the wolf he said, “Let’s see when we are boy,” and opened the transport chamber.

  “What the hell?” He was at the edge of a room full of blue industrial barrels and crates. Looking around, he realized he was still in the cavern. Right where Barr had promised. Almost. One end of the spherical chamber’s near skid was embedded in the crusted stone wall. “Barr, that was close.” Sköll looked around wondering who the alpha had spoken to.

  Cort saw a laminated note on the floor in front of the chamber hatch. Picking it up, he smiled. “Oh you glorious, beautiful people!”

  Dear Cortland,

  If you find this, know you are loved. By a beautiful son named after you, two grandchildren, both boys, and hopefully, by the time you read this, many more descendants who will never know how it all started. But we do. I won’t pretend to have given my heart to you, but you gave me a family. I loved you to the end of my days for that. Thank you. There will be more about our son and family in other notes and books, but right now let me tell you what Matt, (who has been a wonderful father to Little C), Kevellen (yes, even him) and I prepared for you.

  My aunt helped me to acquire the site and place it in trust. Matt and Dr. Kevellen helped me to stock it and preserve things for you. First you have...

  Sköll saw the water in alpha’s eyes, but he didn’t see sadness. Everything was okay.

  --

  Three hours later, Addison had skimmed over the inventory and learned the organization of the warehouse. It was staggering. He decided to wait on opening anything that wasn’t necessary until later. First up, he had to get topside and find out about the world he was a part of once again. Arming himself, he put the Kevlar pack on Sköll, and after donning his own protective gear he grabbed something with a little more power than the MP5 and headed up the tunnel to the surface. Every fifty yards or so, there was a hermetic seal covering the entire tunnel. First he would punch a hole through the seal with a probe. It would measure the air quality, radioactivity, and toxins. Then he would cut a slit in the barrier just long enough for him and the wolf to step through, then he would make his way to the next one. At the last plastic barrier he found a warning written on the other side. With both a biohazard and radiation logo, the warning declared the area off limits until a date many years in the future due to ‘radioactive biologic contamination’.

  Beyond that barrier were the blast doors. He checked their failsafes and then began the painstaking task of opening them. Designed to withstand a near direct nuclear blast, they were meant to be opened by a squad of survivors. Cort wasn’t sure how he was going to do it alone. Maybe he would have to go back and get heavier tools. Then he saw the laminated note: PULL HERE. Pulling the ring, he heard what sounded like a chemical reaction. The panel above the note came to life. First red, then amber, then green LEDs indicated power rising in the battery. Once it topped out two bars below full, Cort pushed the big button marked OPEN.

  Not knowing what to expect, Cort charged the AR15 and waited for the doors to move. Maybe they’re blocked from the other side, or cemented over because of the multiple warnings posted. Wouldn’t that be a hoot. After what seemed minutes the doors began to separate slowly. Sköll’s ears perked up, and Cort stopped doors by pulling the OPEN button. The doors were open just enough to sight the weapon with a narrow sweep. Dammit Amber! He opened the doors enough to step between them and pierce another seal. He could see sunlight through the barrier. What time is it? My watch can’t be right. Pushing the tip of his sensor into the plastic, it wouldn’t even flex the surface. This isn’t Amber’s work. So what am I dealing with? His knife had no effect on the barrier either. It was almost like metal. He closed the blast doors and went back to the cavern.

  Near the cavern exit he found the crate he was looking for. Maybe this delay is a good thing. I should have assessed the situation. Don’t get excited, Cort. Take your time. That entire world up there is an enemy until you prove otherwise. Let’s see if they broadcast anything I can understand. He set up a radio and returned to the blast doors. While the radio scanner’s chemical battery charged, he set up an antenna just outside the blast doors. Then he closed them enough to leave only room for the antenna cable. Finally, he grabbed some of his fresh food and began scanning frequencies. He gave Sköll some raw meat and water, then read part of the “Book of Addison” while listening to the radio and eating fried chicken. Amber had bound dozens letters in book form, each page heavy from the lamination. There were seven volumes. The volumes each had an embossed seal on them. A coat of arms of some sort. There were two wolves as supporters, with a globe and a clock as the ordinary and charge. The motto at the bottom read, “Spes Iacet in Sanguinem”. Cort decided to look that up later. He had read three ‘chapters’ of the first book before the scanner was finished. It had found nothing on any spectrum it could measure. Maybe it’s the other barrier. Or maybe there’s nothing out there. But someone had to put up that barrier.

  Sköll was sniffing around. Cort remembered the inventory. There was a low frame that was sealed. He cut the cover off of it and found a four foot square of dirt. Sköll was immediately interested and relieved himself. “They thought of everything, didn’t they boy?” The wolf looked up at him quizzically, then wandered among the nearby racks and pallets. “I need to rethink our plan. We’re not in the situation I originally envisioned,” he spoke out loud to the aft end of his furry companion. “We have a lot more to work with.”

  --

  He spent the next twenty-four hours carefully going over supplies closest to him, checking to see what had survived three centuries and what hadn’t. Fortunately there was very little of the latter. His friends had also organized the supplies well. The closer they were to the chamber, the sooner he might need them. They had even anticipated that he might set up the cavern as a base. The air scrubbers were already spaced. There were weapons caches near every entrance. He was glad he didn’t get out the day before. He had a home to set up. Without the tunnels there would two hundred fifty thousand cubic feet of air in the sealed cavern. Minus half that for the space taken up by the supplies, four hundred cubic feet a day for him, three hundred for Sköll, so maybe six months of available air. That left the spherical cap of the dome as a safety buffer. Maybe an extra month. But with the tanked air, more like a year. Figure in the scrubbers, and if the heirloom seeds germinate, he could have air for years to come. There was a huge variety of the seeds. Everything from vegetables to medicinal plants and evergreens. The trick was if they would germinate. Freeze dried, then ultra-dried, and double sealed from air and light, the trio had clearly done their research. But would that have worked for three centuries? How did they hide it all from Ben though?

  Sustainable power was his first priority. He set up solar panels between the bubble and the blast doors, leaving only enough space to pass the cables between them. While he was setting the system up, he tried to discern what he could from the opaque barrier. He could see clearly that the sky was still blue, but was surprised that the ground was incredibly green. Clearly the local environment was changed. But that would have to wait for another day. Activating the gel-ion battery packs was as simple as pulling a strip of plastic from them and linking them to the system of cables. By the time the solar output had dropped enough to quit charging the batteries, he had light in his section of the cavern. That night, he and Sköll ate more of the fresh food and he read the rest of volume one out loud to the wo
lf. More than once his eyes filled with tears.

  Two Months Later

  Winter was coming. The last two months had been spent wisely. The cavern was set up. Home. Efficient. There were now solar panels at all three of the blast doors, and with his treadmills and kinetic chargers, Cort had put the chemical batteries away for emergencies. His power needs were minimal, so gel packs seldom dropped below ninety-five percent naturally, but he rotated them to the grow lights, making sure that each battery was drained to below five percent at least once every two weeks. He was glad he had saved the fresh vegetables and fruit that had been in the transport chamber with him, as most of the seeds had failed to grow. But with the few that did, and by recycling his and Sköll’s waste, he had a respectable garden. There was a multitude of vegetables, some vine fruit, and even four saplings. Two apple trees, and two orange. From the seeds, he had gotten potatoes, carrots, and various tubers. The rest of the freeze dried meat they had brought with them was allotted to Sköll, while Cort relied on vitamins, carbs, and vegetables. He craved meat protein though. By the time Spring arrived, he would be well and truly ready to leave the barrier, if only for meat. That was his goal, though. He would be ready, and able, to leave the cavern by Spring.

  Elsewhere, he had resealed the hermetic tunnel seals with adhesive zippers. More to control the cavern humidity than any other reason. Until he was sure he could leave, moisture was precious. He had cleared the outer edge of the cavern for its entire circumference. When the batteries were fully charged he would run the 1.6 mile circle with Sköll for an hour. When they weren’t, he charged them by running on the treadmill or using the exercise bike. Even the weight machine they had left him generated electricity.

  At noon, according to the watch he had synchronized to the solar meters on the charging system, he was rotating a battery from the grow lights back to the solar array. After making all the connections he checked the charge meters to make sure his connections were good. Normally they ran at about forty percent efficiency. Cort suspected this was because of the opaqueness of the outer barriers. The southernmost panel array ran a bit higher, at an average of forty-three percent, but they hadn’t varied much since the arrays were fully operational. Until now. Hurriedly, Cort rechecked his connections and the meters. The northwest array was operating at sixty-three percent. More light was getting through. Much more light.

  Sköll immediately picked up on the alpha’s change. He stood still as the covering was strapped around him. Then the alpha donned his own. Hearing his name from the cover on the alpha’s head, he ran up the tunnel behind his leader.

  Cort charged the AR15 as he ran. At each barrier he burst through the military zippers, knowing they would reseal easily if needed.

  Outside the Cavern

  Lieutenant Val watched the corporal clearing the dust from the transparent barrier. It had been erected after the last plague over a century before. That plague had been a weapon, and everyone knew it didn’t come from The Waste, as this area had come to be known, but after thirteen billion people die in a matter of weeks, you don’t take any more chances. Back in the twenty-first century this area had been abandoned due to some sort of biological weapon experiment gone bad. The internal sensors at the facility detected both high radiation and biologic contamination. It was common enough. There was a place called Chernobyl where people still couldn’t live because of a twentieth century nuclear accident. After The Cull, as the last plague was known, every known or suspected contamination site on Earth was sealed in the tempered and metallized Formvar. It was nearly impregnable by tools. Contaminants didn’t have a chance against it. Since last month, they had noticed a steady rise in sensor readings around each of these three large barriers. Both thermal and EM. It hadn’t been significant though, so the monitors hadn’t reported it until their quarterly reports. That resulted in the Hazardous Response Team arriving with Val’s security squad.

  “Sir, there is a new structure inside the Formvar-M barrier. It appears to be some sort of energy collection array. Maybe an old style solar panel.”

  “Finish clearing the surface. I am not calling in until I have something to report. Sergeant Thoms, begin recording just in case, though. Is your team detecting anything, Doctor?” Val asked the leader of the HRT.

  “No, Lieutenant, but it appears the doors are open slightly. Perhaps a centimeter.”

  Sergeant Thoms spoke up. “No, sir. They are opening wider now. Arm weapons team!” The static whine of the disrupters filled the air around them. “What the hell is that?”

  Thoms was pointing to the smaller of the two beings that emerged from the long-sealed doors. He had only seen them in pics and vids. “I think it is a dog, sir. An honest-to-gods dog!”

  Inside

  Cort pushed the end of the video cable through the opening in the blast doors. It moved along the top of the solar cable, catching now and again on ridges in the doors. Once it was through he saw nine men on his handheld. Two of them were clearing dust from the outside of the barrier. Mystery solved. The men were in protective suits that appeared to be similar to hazmat suits. Not full body armor like he had donned while running up the tunnel. Clearly they were human though. One might be female. He wasn’t sure. There were two teams. Five were clearly military. The other four probably scientists. One of the scientists pointed at the base of the door opening and said something to the one that was clearly the leader of the military contingent.

  Leader first. Then the one with Google Glass looking thing on. Then the other three military, left to right. If the scientists resist, all but the small one behind the maybe-female. Cort had prioritized his targets almost subconsciously. If they drop the barrier. Well, no guts, no glory. He reached over and pushed the OPEN button. As the doors slid apart, he unsafed all his weapons and knives. Sköll stepped through the doors right beside him. Several of the men outside pointed at Sköll and were very excited. His nape stood up.

  --

  “Lieutenant, get me that dog. Alive. That is now the mission priority. Nothing else matters,” the doctor told Val.

  “Yes ma’am. But we have to do it my way.” Turning to the corporal he said, “Corporal, how long to bring down the barrier?”

  “Two hours, sir.”

  “Begin now. I’m going to try to communicate in the meantime. Doctor what are your scanners reading?”

  Clare Gaines was the only female in the group. She was also the Head of Sciences for this region. She knew it wasn’t a dog, but she didn’t want the others to know. It was a wolf. An apparent perfect specimen. And an uncut male. It was like finding Solomon’s Mines, scientifically speaking. There hadn’t been a live canine of any species in over a hundred and fifty years. And none outside of a lab in two hundred. This wolf was officially the most important creature on the planet. “Completely safe. There are no dangerous contagions. I am picking up some unusual biotics, but nothing our synthetics can’t handle. It is safe to open.” She emphasized the point by removing her hood, then the rest of her ‘materials’ suit. The rest of her team and the security detail followed her example and stripped to their tunics.

  --

  Cort was struck by the beauty of the people in front of him. They all wore tight fitting tunics under the protective suits. They were tall and thin. Almost anorexic by his standards. But they had a graceful look about them. Their skin was an olive brown color and flawless. All of them had brown eyes. They had hair on their head, but not their faces. Not even eyelashes. Looking more closely, they also had none on their arms. They were flawless. No moles or freckles. Not a single flaw. In a show of friendship, he took off his body armor. Until the wall comes down, anyway.

  --

  The man inside the Formvar barrier was like something else from a history book. He was a mountain. He had to weigh one hundred fifteen kilos. At least. And he was lean. Not like the large men in the history books. More like a living image of Hercules. His shoulders were broad. His eyes were so pale a green they were almost gray. And
he had as much hair as the dog, it seemed. Not just on his head, it covered his face. A beard? Dr. Gaines thought that was what they called it. His arms were covered in fine dark fur as well. Like finding a Neanderthal. His coif was close cropped and dark, with speckles of white in it. His skin was flawed. He had a dent under his tunic, on his chest. It was the size of a stylus. And one arm had a long trough in the hair on it. It went from his elbow to his wrist, wrapping halfway around his forearm. But the scar on his face was incredible. It began left of where his widow’s peak was and went down across his face to his jawline, splitting the hair as it went. As the man turned his head to look at the lieutenant, she saw it aligned with the dent in his chest. A long wound then. But why didn’t the synthetics repair him? Of course. He’s not from now. He’s from before the plague, before the nano-synthetics. But how? He couldn’t have lived here all that time. He would be two hundred years old. The man before her may be deformed, but he was clearly only thirty-five, at the most. It can’t be him. But the scar.

  --

  Cort bent to the pile of body armor and pulled a paper pad from a MOLLE pouch on his vest. He tore the cellophane from it and began to write with a pencil. “DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH?” he held the paper up to the clear barrier.

  Val grabbed his flex pad and wrote on it. “YES” was written on it when he turned it around to show to the man inside the barrier.