Cataclysmic Evolution - 5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

Barron wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his arm. He’d never worked so hard—not even looking for supplies and survivors. Of course, he wasn’t likely to come across any dead bodies here.

The metal scavenged from all the towns was dumped into a giant pile and had to be separated. By hand. Even more barbaric, by the time they were done moving the metal into the giant underground bunker each night, they barely had enough time to wash… in the lake.

He whistled to get his crew’s attention. He had Creed, Thavin, and William, plus several other guys from his class he’d never really been on more than nodding terms with. He also had four guys from Winchester. They mostly kept town people together in the bunk areas but the crews were mixed. Probably to foster cooperation, or some other such crap.

“Time for our au natural soak and dinner.” The sun would be up within the hour. The fast approaching summer didn’t leave much nighttime, but they’d worked hard and almost finished the sorting. A soldier stood outside the bunker. He marked off Barron’s group chits.

Some people had protested contributing to the group effort to stay alive. They didn’t work, they didn’t get a chit. They didn’t get a chit, they didn’t get food or water. There was a lot of shock and grumbling, but no one outright rebelled. Where would they go? The surrounding countryside had been stripped clean by the military crew, so there was no way a human would survive a single hour once the sun rose.

The martial discipline wasn’t hard for Barron to accept. He’d lived with his father’s version most of his life. Do what was expected of you and keep your trap shut. He could do it. William needed more reining in, but his friend had far fewer jokes to tell than before.

There wasn’t much to laugh about.

Mess Hall was full with late shifters shoveling in their rations. MREs. Yum. Barron shuddered at the idea of eating reconstituted mac and cheese yet again, but when he was handed the mud brown packet he kept his mouth shut.

“Oh yuck, powdered cheese again. These things are from the stone ages,” Creed complained.

Barron elbowed him in the ribs. “Eat it.” He took another bite out of the packet and tried not to taste it.

“I’d kill for something fresh.”

Barron swallowed. “There is nothing fresh. Did you see those trees by the lake? Dead. All the plants are gone. I’m just glad there weren’t any fish in that lake.”

Small animals died in droves.

Thavin opened his mouth, but Barron scowled at him. “Just eat it and stop bitching.”

“No, it’s not that.” Thavin stared out the double doors. Barron looked over his shoulder. A steady stream of people filled the hall—all headed toward the huge bunker hanger. “What do you think’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” Barron shoveled the last few bites of his pasta down, then grabbed his bottle of water. “Let’s go see.”

The crowd gathered around a man standing on top of a Humvee. He was leaning down, speaking to someone on the ground. He waved a hand, then nodded.

Barron could see the shiny emblem on his collar when he stood, reflecting the makeshift lights set up around him. Someone important then.

“I hope most of you can hear me,” the man shouted. “My name is General Keene. This is my base. I know life has been very hard in the last month, with few answers as to what happened on the seventh of May, or why.

“We’ve discovered a way to communicate with other bases. It’s beyond archaic, but the military has the equipment for Morse code. We’ve learned this wasn’t just our area, or state, or even country. The entire Western Hemisphere experienced the light event that knocked out our power.”

“Was it a bomb?” someone shouted.

“Will there be more?”

“People, people,”—the general held up his hands—“please listen, and I’ll tell you everything I know.”

“Yeah right.” Thavin snorted.

“Shut it,” Barron snapped.

“The light was not a bomb, or an attack on the West from the East. They’re starting to experience the same environmental die-offs we’re seeing here, on a larger scale too. Our real answers came when we received a broadcast by the Joint Space Venture. Orbiting craft and sensors showed a burst of gamma radiation of deep space origin.”

Dead silence greeted his words. Barron wasn’t the only one confused, apparently, but Thavin must have understood where the general was going because he swayed on his feet, reaching out for William’s shoulder blindly.

“The scientists postulate that a star collapsed, and when it did, it emitted a ray of gamma radiation capable of traveling at unprecedented speeds… and Earth was in its path. This is an extinction level event, people. Life on Earth as we know it will cease to exist very soon.”

Soldiers began wading into the crowd, trying to calm the shouts, screams, and panicked sobbing. Barron could barely feel the ground beneath his feet. Nothing felt real, not the bodies pressed around him, or—most of all—the news the general so bluntly stated.

“Citizens, please calm down!” General Keene roared. “There’s more!”

“What the hell is wrong with you?” a man in the front shouted. He shook a fist at the soldier in front him trying to get to him to be quiet. “No I will not quiet down. How can you expect us to be calm when you said we’re going to die?”

“I said life on Earth was going to end… I didn’t say we plan on sticking around for it.” General Keene’s shout finally made its way through enough of the crowd. Panic was replaced by confusion. “The gamma radiation has already begun a life cycle die off. Any humans exposed to the ray died within moments, or hours, depending on the amount of shielding. Half the ozone layer on Earth has disappeared, and the brown clouds now blocking the sun don’t actually block the harmful UV and UVB rays—hence the extreme damage to anyone exposed to the light. In short, the surface of the Earth will soon be unlivable.”

Barron shook his head. He didn’t mean—

“This base was built around the manufacturing center for deep space craft. A carefully picked colony plant—the first ever—was going to be sent to a habitable planet found by the JSV. Now that colony ship is going to be a life raft. Our life raft.”

Barron had never considered military service or space travel. They’d all heard of the colony slated to leave in the next two years, but it seemed like such a far off event. He’d not paid much attention, but he knew the details shared had been vague.

“How will any of us survive long enough to reach another habitable planet?” A woman cradled a baby against her hip. “Will my son even see it?”

“Are you talking about cryosleep? I heard the last mission went horribly wrong, and no one survived.”

The general placed his hands behind his back. “Under ordinary circumstances, this information would not have been shared until the colony was successfully entrenched on Paradise. The most classified secret in this project was the new fold technology engines. With a special anti-matter field, we’ll be able to shrink space, in essence, in front of the ship. This will allow space travel at an unprecedented speed. For it to work, though, the hull must be formed with an interlocking carbon nanotube coating, filled with fluid to block radiation from space and stand up to the pressures of the space folding.”

“The metal,” William whispered.

“Your efforts to bring the materials we need, and the work done over the last few weeks, means we’ve nearly completed the ship. Fortunately, the computer systems were not yet operational and the gamma ray didn’t fry them like most of the other operating tech in the hemisphere. Another week and the entire CI would have been a smoking ruin. But that didn’t happen, and we’re going to make it. We number in the hundreds now, but we’ve sent out the call to anyone who can make it under the cover of darkness to congregate here. We will leave no one behind if they can make it.”

“What about supplies? What about water and food? How will there be enough?” Barron recognized Mr. Hodge’s voice. After leaving their homes because there was no way to survive without supplies, it was something many of them had to be privately wondering.

“Not all the metal, plastics, and other fabric gathered are intended for the ship hull. Another classified secret is a large scale replicator that can break down objects to their basic molecules and then reassemble them into needed items—like food, clothing, and other necessities.

“Obviously, there will be some reduction in raw molecules over time, but with vigilant recycling, it’ll last a long time, certainly long enough to set up the colony and begin to appropriate material to replace our stocks. Now, I will attempt to answer questions—if they are presented in a calm fashion.”

“You claim to not know about the gamma thingy. But, if that’s true, how come this ship is so conveniently prepared?”

“Do you really believe that, if we knew this was coming, we’d send a mission to a new planet filled with civilians?” the general scoffed. “No.”

“Earth has been doomed for far longer than the month since the UV gamma radiation ray. Scientists have studied the world, and there were signs for decades that we’ve been wavering on a knifepoint with destruction of humankind on either side. Anyone could know that; it was recently beamed through the news feeds, in fact.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “This is not some grand conspiracy. Life doesn’t work out like that. This is a goddamned tragedy for the human race. One that just might spell extinction for all of us, if we’re not careful.” The general kept talking, but Barron wasn’t really listening.

Space.

A new planet.

“We’re gonna be aliens,” William said. He grinned and ran a hand through his curling hair. “I wonder what it’ll be like.”

“Different.” Thavin looked up at the ceiling of the hanger, as if he could see beyond it to the disappearing stars. “I read a lot of science fiction stories. People always try to relate to the new planet like it’s just a new part of their own, with some strange plants and creatures. But the truth… it could be anything. Probably way different than anything we could dream up.”

“Come on, let’s get some sleep. I’m sure we’re all going to be swamped with things to do until they shove us in their tin can spaceship.” Barron was wiped out and longed for the oblivion of sleep.

In the ten days that followed, Barron found out just how right he was. He knew why basic soldiers were called grunts after that. His group saw more of the ship than most, ferrying around supplies, carting tools and crates, and passing messages.

It was a big ship, but there were a lot of people coming to get on it. Thousands had already come, with more arriving each night. They were crammed into the base anywhere it was safe—a lot of the space was underground. Thankfully the ship was in a separate chamber built into the side of the mountain. He had no idea how in the hell they planned to get it out to launch.

No one would tell him either. Like it would really matter, when they were all leaving Earth for good in the floating tin can anyway. Barron wasn’t good trapped indoors. He liked staying busy, seeing and doing new things.

How was he going to manage a space flight?

Barron tried not to think about it too much. He couldn’t change it. He just had to live with it. He knew how to do that better than most.

The exodus into the ship began two weeks after General Keene’s revelations. Barron made sure his stuff was all secured in his bag, and settled it firmly on his back. They were loading folks on the ship by town. His was one of the first in the order.

The hanger was a zoo by the time he got there.

“Where were you hiding?” Mr. Hodge asked when Barron slid through a knot of people to check in with him. Each town had a head who would liaison with the ship staff. Before everyone crashed, exhausted from prepping for launch manually, the chain of command was shared in a last announcement. General Keene introduced the ship captain, the man who held all their lives in his hands.

Captain DeLeon was a lean man, Hispanic, with grizzled hair and a face that would likely crack if he ever smiled. Barron was more than willing to stay away from the man and the hulking security staff, but he wasn’t hiding.

“Just getting my stuff,” he told Mr. Hodge.

“Well your friends already checked in. We’ll head over to the ship as soon as the sun goes down far enough. We have to move before the light completely fades, so make sure you stay under the UV shaded walkway rigged up. It’s not big, so stay in line.”

Barron snorted. Graduation would’ve come and gone the night before, and here he was, still walking in lines and checking in with the teacher. “Got it, Mr. Hodge.”

There were about thirty people from his town in a clump by the door. The sunset couldn’t break the cloud cover, but the light was fading. There was a nice breeze occasionally gusting in through the door, bringing the smell of hot dust and concrete.

He missed the scent of green things, but Barron closed his eyes and tried to memorize the feeling of the warm air caressing his face and ruffling his hair.

“All right, everyone. One last time. Single file, stay in line, and don’t move from under the UV shade. We’re in D section on the third level on the ship. Each room sleeps eight. We split based on gender.” Not a single couple had made it through the gamma radiation.

“Let’s go.”

Barron shuffled along in the middle of the group, just behind the kids and Jenn. Dread coiled in the pit of his stomach. He was consigning himself to a tin tube. Well, not tin—a carbon-nano-filled-with-funky-fluids—tube.

“Bunny!”

“Marya!”

The cries startled Barron out of his funk. Jenn stood at the edge of the shade, one arm reaching for the little girl racing out into the sun. Barron dropped his bag and yanked off his windbreaker, running after Marya who began shrieking as she tried to find her stuffed bunny.

He scooped Marya up, covering her with the jacket. She flailed, knocking off his hat and exposing his face to the sun.

“Bunny! Bunny!” she sobbed.

“Barron, get back under the shade!”

Barron squinted, trying to see through the tears streaming down his face. It felt like the skin was peeling off his arms, neck and face. Her pink bunny was rolling away. He lunged for it. He stumbled but managed to grab one of its ears.

Marya was still crying and squirming, but Barron managed to hold onto her and the bunny and scramble back for the waiting crowd under the shade. He stumbled, unable to see anything but bright-white light, and fell to his knees.

Barron whimpered when they dragged him under the shade. His entire body felt like it was on fire. Someone took Marya and the bunny, and then grabbed his hands.

Agony from the touch lanced up his arms. He screamed, jerking away. It felt like his skin tore off in their grip, exposing his nerve endings to the biting air.

“We have to pick you up, Barron. I’m sorry.”

Barron shook his head. “Don’t touch me!”

“You can’t just lay here, we have to get you to the med bay.”

“No,” he moaned. His protests didn’t stop them from reaching for him. Hands lifted him under his shoulders and along his sides and legs. They didn’t touch his bare skin, but it was too much.

The pain overwhelmed him. He wanted to scream, but he couldn’t breathe. Dying shouldn’t hurt this much.