Warrior Chronicles 1: Warrior's Scar Page 8

  “YOUR NAME? I AM ADDISON.”

  “VAL. WHERE ARE YOU FROM?” Addysun. An odd name. Too many syllables.

  Cort wasn’t ready to divulge his history just yet. “HERE. I LIVE IN THIS CAVERN.”

  Gaines spoke. “Ask him about the dog.”

  “YOUR ANIMAL. IT IS A DOG, CORRECT?” Val wrote.

  “SKÖLL IS A WOLF. A GRAY WOLF.” Why wouldn’t they know that? Unless…. He added, “ARE THEY EXTINCT NOW?”

  The woman looked at the one called Val and spoke. So the civilians are still in charge. Interesting. She nodded.

  Val wrote, “ALL DOGS ARE EXTINCT. CANINES DIED 200 YEARS AGO. YOUR DOG IS IMPORTANT.”

  “YES HE IS. ESPECIALLY TO ME.”

  “I UNDERSTAND.” He will not give his pet up willingly. We will have to take it.

  “GOOD. WHAT IS THE GOVERNMENT?”

  “UNA. UNITED NORTH AMERICA. PART OF ATLANTICA. HOW LONG HAVE YOU LIVED HERE?” Who but a hermit could not know of UNA? Even a hermit would know. Who is Addysun?

  “YOU WOULDN’T BELIEVE. WHAT IS ATLANTICA?”

  “EUROPE AND NORTH AMERICA. DEFENSE PACT. UNDERSTAND?” Well, we did find him under a rock.

  “IS THAT LIKE NATO?” No more USA. Hmm.

  “NEW NAME. MORE POWER. ONE GOVERNMENT. NATO WAS LONG AGO. HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN HERE?”

  “YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE.” Cort pointed to the two men attaching leads to the barrier. “ARE THEY TAKING THE BARRIER DOWN?” When Val nodded Cort wrote, “HOW LONG? DO WE NEED TO MOVE BACK?”

  “NO. IT WILL DISSOLVE. ABOUT AN HOUR. TRY ME. HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN HERE?” He is avoiding the question. Do not give him too much information.

  Cort decided to lay his cards on the table. The barrier was coming down. They knew he was here now. Better his terms than theirs. Later he would wonder if it had been the right choice. He would never know. “304 YEARS.” He saw the shock on the faces outside the barrier. Only the corporal didn’t see his response. But he looked up when the others appeared to gasp.

  “IMPOSSIBLE. TELL THE TRUTH. DO NOT TRIFLE WITH ME.” Absurd. He’s insane. His synthetics have failed. Maybe exposure to whatever is inside.

  “SAID YOU WON’T BELIEVE. YOU SHOULD HAVE LISTENED.” Cort put the pad down and began to don his armor again. This just took a bad turn. Once all the armor was back on, he picked up the pad again.

  Val had written, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”

  “PREPARING.”

  “FOR WHAT?” It does not matter. His synthetics will still deactivate.

  “YOU TELL ME.” To kill you. To kill you all, if I have to. Don’t make me, Val.

  “NOTHING TO FEAR.”

  “UNLESS I TRIFLE WITH YOU? I AM NOT AFRAID.”

  “WHERE ARE YOU FROM?”

  “NOT WHERE. WHEN. I TOLD YOU. 304 YEARS.”

  “WE WILL DISCUSS WHEN BARRIER IS DOWN. WE NEED YOUR DOG.” Why do we need dogs?

  “NO. HE IS MY FRIEND. I WILL PROTECT HIM.” As if he needs it. He’s not the puppy in a snare anymore.

  “HE IS NOT IN DANGER. WE NEED HIM TO RESTORE DOGS.”

  “I WILL GLADLY GIVE YOU SAMPLE OF BLOOD. YOU CANNOT HAVE HIM.”

  “WE WILL DISCUSS WHEN BARRIER IS DOWN. HOW OLD ARE YOU?”

  “THIRTY-FIVE YEARS. YOU?”

  “FORTY TWO.” The female said something. “ARE THERE MORE DOGS? PEOPLE?”

  Cort didn’t want to give up this information. “ENOUGH TO DEFEND OUR HOME.” And enough supplies to hold out forever. I will have to blow the entrances. “Well, Sköll, old boy,” He spoke aloud, “It doesn’t look like we’re in Kansas anymore.” Sköll looked up at the alpha. They are enemies, aren't they, Alpha?

  “HOW MANY?” If the entrance distances are any indication, there could be thousands. I’m going to need to call for assistance after we neutralize Addysun.

  “THIS IS NOT GOING WELL. PERHAPS I SHOULD SPEAK TO HER, SINCE SHE IS CLEARLY YOUR SUPERIOR.” Cort saw the dig hit home. The barrier was only a few inches thick now.

  “I AM IN CHARGE. NOT HER. AND NOT YOU.” A little behind Val, the woman smirked.

  “PLEASE DO NOT TAKE THE BARRIER DOWN. PLEASE. IT WILL NOT END WELL.” People never change. Nor do I.

  “I AM IN CHARGE. THE BARRIER COMES DOWN. DO NOT TRIFLE.”

  Cort showed his last message again.

  “YOU ALREADY SAID THAT.”

  Cort had reached the end of his pad. He turned it over and began writing on the backs of the pages. “BUT YOU DID NOT LISTEN. I AM SORRY.” The barrier was only an inch thick now. Cort tapped on Sköll’s head. The wolf backed away from the barrier slowly. Cort pulled the solar array backward and to the side. He closed the massive doors until only enough room for a man was still between them. He told Sköll to stay and stepped to the front of the doors. He knew the wolf wouldn’t listen, but he hoped anyway. When he stopped, the wolf stood beside him. The last of the barrier was melting away as he raised his weapon.

  --

  Val’s team had moved in front of the scientists. Gaines started to warn him about the synthetics, but he ignored her as the barrier became low enough to jump over. “Get the dog! Stun Addysun, then secure the opening, in that order!” Two of the men immediately moved toward the gray wolf. Sköll lunged at the neck of the nearest one. Before the two of them were on the ground, Cort had put three rounds through the second man’s head. As Gaines screamed in horror, the other three men raised their weapons and fired. Nothing happened. The man should have been immobilized. The disruptors should have deactivated his synthetics. Val realized the error as he saw Addysun’s weapon fire again. What Gaines was trying to say. Addysun doesn’t have the synthetics. The weapons are useless. He looked at the corporal who was missing part of his neck as the dog, the wolf, lunged at him. What will happen if the synthetics are ingested by the animal? It was his last rational thought as beast tore out his throat.

  Addison turned his weapon on the remaining military man. Cort’s forearm was burning from the inside. The weapon must have hit him. One second later, only the academics remained. He pointed the weapon at the four scientists. Sköll went for the nearest of them while Cort began gathering the weapons on the ground. They have to know I’m willing to kill them too. After the next man died, he called Sköll to his side and said, “Inside. Now!” He looked at the burning wound on his arm. There was nothing there. His arm was returning to normal now. What the hell? The three trembling people slowly moved inside. Gaines felt as if her legs were made of stone but followed the man’s instructions. Once they were all inside, he closed the blast doors and turned on a flashlight. “That way. Now.” No, it most certainly did not end well. Addison shared the thought that was also going through Gaines’ mind.

  Inside the second seal, Addison made them sit with their backs to the wall. “If you run, he will kill you. Do you understand?” The terrified scientists nodded. “Sköll. GUARD.” Sköll crossed the tunnel and sat watching the humans. His alpha laid the bright thing next to him. “I think you know I’m serious. He killed just as many of you as I did. Don’t test him.” Addison disappeared through the next seal.

  When he returned, he secured each of the scientists. Then he opened the blast doors and left only the bodies of Sköll’s victims outside. The others he drug out of sight. He was suddenly sorry that he didn’t have time to look outside at this world. But he had work to do. Hopefully, when someone came to look for the bodies, they would think the men had fallen victim to some animal when they broke the seal. It would be true, but Cort didn’t want the ‘top-siders’ to know the animal was a man just yet. After sealing the doors again, he returned to his prisoners.

  “Do you know what torture is?” The alarmed looks from all three answered the question before their nods could. “I don’t like torture, but I am proficient at it. So I will give you all one chance to avoid it. I am going to separate you. So long as you are cooperative, I will hurt none of you. After you are separated and secure, I will bring you water. While I rest and formulate
my questions, you will be left alone. Do you know about dogs? About wolves?” Without waiting for an answer, he continued, “They have incredible hearing. If Sköll hears you move around, he will see you as a threat to me. And you have seen the results of that assessment. After I rest, I will ask you all the same questions. If your answers are all the same, you live. Anyone who answers differently than the other two will not live. Your honesty protects your life. Do you all understand? Answer me, please. I would like to hear your voices.”

  One by one, they responded that they understood. Their voices were similar and harmonious. The Mormon Choir back home would love these people. Add religion to the list of questions. Good, follow my instructions. Cort place a hood over the head of one of the scientists and led him to another section of another tunnel. There he shackled him to a ringbolt in the wall. After testing its strength, he moved the next scientist. It was the woman this time. Once she was secure in the third tunnel he asked, “Do you have any toilet needs?”

  “Toilet needs?” Why would he ask that? Is he attracted to me? Oh Gods! Is he going to coercively mate me?

  “Do you need to relieve yourself?” he asked.

  “Oh. You mean defecate. No. We have attributes that reduce that necessity. Thank you.” What a strange man you are. You killed so many without a thought, but ask about our personal needs. Just as Grandfather’s books describe. Loving and deadly. But it can’t be him. He’s a fairy tale. Like Mother Goose.

  “Very well. I will return in a few hours. Do not worry. I won’t harm you so long as you are honest.”

  “May I ask you something? Where are you really from?”

  “I already told you. I entered this cavern three hundred and four years ago. I was not being dishonest.” Colt looked at her. She would be questioned last. She was the most dangerous of the three.

  “No. I do not think you were. Thank you for your considerations.” I must be insane. But I think it might really be him.

  After securing the last scientist... Were they scientists? Cort moved to the middle of the cavern. He had a clear line of sight to each of the tunnels, as did Sköll.

  Two hours later, Cort had calmed enough to conduct the questioning of his three prisoners. He had long ago, really long ago he realized, learned to wait for the adrenaline surge of combat to subside before interrogating a subject. Especially non-military subjects. He spent the time making a list of questions. After rewriting the list in random order to avoid leading questions as much as possible, he transferred the list to another pad. Beneath each written question, he left enough for a reasonable answer. He repeated the process twice. He then went to each prisoner and removed their hood. Placing a chemlight, a plastic bottle of water, one of the pads and a pencil in front of them, he then cut their arms free. “You have one hour to answer the questions. Do you understand?” After they acknowledged him, he left before they could say anything else.

  Five

  He wasn’t surprised by many of the answers. But he was very surprised that all three of his subjects’ answers were reasonably uniform. They differed on questions that were subjective, such as important recent historical events, but their answers to direct questions were mostly the same. What he now knew painted an interesting picture though. He would use that picture to formulate a second round of questions, then he would allow them to ask a few questions of their own. After that he would assess the situation again and determine his next steps.

  Two hundred years ago, there was a flu outbreak. It wiped out every canine species on Earth. Two more decades of testing and nearly every canine in captivity was also dead. It was another decade later before they found a cure for the disease. There had been a plan to clone dogs at that point, but then an even worse disaster struck. After The Cull, there was not enough genetic material left to clone the animals.

  The Cull. Humanity at its best. Thirty years after the dog flu, a religious group decided to hurry Armageddon along. A splinter sect of Islam and Judaism, the sect engineered a virus. One that had a ninety-six percent mortality rate. Distributed via food and water supply seeding, the virus had infected over twelve billion people, or two-thirds of the world’s population. Over the course of three weeks, nearly every infected person had died. It sounded as if the gestation period was over a month. Within two years, another billion and a half had died from secondary effects of the crisis. There were areas that had been heavily populated prior to the virus that still hadn’t been reentered.

  After society began to rebuild, several defensive pacts were either formed or resurrected. United North America was the first of these. Canada, the United States, and Mexico decided to form a triumvirate government to guard over the entire continent. The smaller countries such as Greenland and the Latin American states joined immediately. Africa and Australia formed a similar alliance known as Southern Alliance, and South American countries joined them within a decade. When China, India, and Russia formed the Asianic Alliance, The European Union applied for membership to the UNA, citing the NATO pact. Soon, Atlantica was formed. Each of the three major alliances was governed similarly. Free trade across borders, mostly independent states with equally independent sub-states, and a central government whose only real powers existed in regulation and mutual defense. There had been one small conflict in the Baltic States since then, but no major military conflicts. For the past one hundred years, the world had been at peace. The Asianic Alliance was the wealthiest of the alliances, and the Southern Alliance the poorest. But the numbers weren’t dramatically different. Global climate change had left each of the zones with their own blessings and curses. They could exist independently of each other, and there was virtually no trade between them. The vast majority of diplomacy between the alliances was scientific in nature. One of the scientists, who appeared to have some knowledge of history, had added that intellectual property no longer existed anywhere, leading to unprecedented advancement of technology and medicine.

  There was a permanent moon base once. The Cull had left it to fend for itself, and it was believed they were all dead. Mars had a thriving colony. Eleven thousand people. It was completely self-sufficient and administered by Atlantica. Several times a year, a ship was launched to the red planet with additional equipment and colonists. There had been four children born on Mars. It was a one way trip though. Establishing the colony used all available resources, so no thought was given to returning to Earth. Soon they would be launching atmosphere plants to the colony. Those massive structures would begin a centuries long process of giving the red planet a breathable atmosphere.

  There had been many advancements as well. There were vast floating farms that grew food crops on the surface. Beneath the plants, fish farms maintained the root systems and provided animal protein as well. Energy was generated via wind, sun, and photochemical reactions. Fossil fuel usage was a thing of the past.

  Religion was interesting. You could believe whatever you wanted, but in order for your religion to organize, it had to acknowledge the divinities of all other religions as equal to your own. It was a requirement that ensured true religious equality. And failure to adhere to your acknowledgement meant your religion was stripped of its protections and its leaders imprisoned.

  Corporate crime was punished severely. Any company which knowingly violated the law was immediately disbanded and its assets sold to its competitors. The profits from the sale were added to the general fund of the affected governments. The officers or owners of that company, including all shareholders, were subject to individual punishment based on the type of offense. Governments of all levels were subject to the same penalties.

  Civilian punishment had also changed. In UNA, there were four degrees of punishment. Minor nonviolent infractions meant one week of service to your community. The second minor offense or a first moderate offense meant one month of service. With a third nonviolent offense or a first non-lethal violent offense you got one year of farm service away from your community. A second non-lethal violent offense left you wit
h two options: Emigrate to the Mars Colony if you were accepted there, or banishment to a non-allied country willing to accept you. If no one accepted you, you were sent to a detention island, such as Catalina. That sounded like a “Lord of the Flies” type of place. It certainly wasn’t the Catalina Cort used to fish and vacation near. Lethal violent offenses had only one punishment. Lethality. It sounded as if they were able to download information from your memory somehow. There was no doubt of guilt, but more importantly, there was no question of intent. They had some way to know what your intentions were when you committed the crime. It was probably related to the synthetics.

  That had been the most relevant change. Synthetics, short for nano-synthetics.

  A synthetic metallic blood supplement, every human was given them at birth. A pan-vaccine and cure-all, the synthetics grew and protected humans from all ills and injuries. The downside was the early versions had eliminated virtually all recessive genetic traits within five human generations. That is why the top-siders were so uniform. And why they had no birthmarks or freckles or even scars. Before scar tissue could form, the synthetics healed most injuries, except for the most serious or traumatic. Such as the back of your head being removed by a bullet. Or a wolf tearing out your throat. Average life expectancy was one hundred and thirty years. People worked well past their hundredth birthdays. The weapons that had been used against him and Sköll were designed to temporarily or permanently deactivate the synthetics. Which is why Cort shot Sköll.