Doomsday Warrior 01 (32 page)

We have taken their religion and substituted dead bodies to worship. Vassily saw it all now—he was forced to see it from his daily reports of starvation, rioting and rebellion. The whole planet was ready to explode again. The war had all been for nothing. The cultures, the great religions of the worlds, the beautiful wonders—the Eiffel Tower, the Roman Palaces, the Acropolis, Paris, Venice, London, Leningrad, Tokyo—all were gone, all were now leveled, radioactive plains, swept to this day by deadly winds. And all for nothing.

The world was sliding slowly back into primitives times. Technology had stagnated in most areas for the past hundred years. Each year, the ability to build machines, electrical generators and weaponry regressed. As was the ability to service those machines still functioning. Even the Russians had let their technology stagnate, preferring to use what was left over after the war. They continued to produce tanks and rifles, but all R&D had ceased. Only the huge control station outside of Moscow was kept up to date as it still kept the forty spy satellites aloft—the killers that had shot down the American retaliatory strike with laser and particle beams. It wasn’t really needed anymore as no other country possessed nuclear weapons. All were within the Red Empire now anyway—still the central control station was furnished with all the money it needed. It was almost a ritual offering to the past and the weapons that had won the war for the Reds. But otherwise, the entire planet was sinking back into the Middle Ages.

The empire Vassily had inherited in the bloody power struggles twenty-two years before had diminished in size. Half the south Asian peninsula was no longer firmly in control. The war lords there—some ex-Russian army officers—had carved out their own little empires. Nothing came back to Mother Russia from those places. China was nearly a third under the control of the fanatical Muabir, the Flame of Allah. His hordes of horse-riding crazed soldiers were attacking Russian convoys more and more frequently. Half of Indochina was immersed in mystical Buddhism as more and more monks burned themselves in protest. The Red troops were powerless to gain control of people who would kill themselves rather than submit. Everywhere, there was resistance—even Killov couldn’t stop the American rebels. Stalinville had even been attacked by what the officials there had said was a five-hundred-man force, and a munitions dump had been blown up. These pesky mosquitos were turning into tarantulas, Vassily thought uncomfortably.

I am only trying to keep the world together under one power so there will be no divisions that will again become nations—nations that will eventually have another world war and finish off our tottering ecology. I am on the Earth’s side. I swear it, Vassily said silently to that little bit of belief in God inside him.

Ruwanda appeared, holding the silver tray with his now twice-daily hypodermic injection on it. A hypo instead of his customary golden brandy. Everyone was plotting against him. Why were the lesions on his body getting bigger, the welts under his blue-green skin more numerous? Why were his legs more unsteady each day? Were the doctors in league with Killov?

Perhaps the doctors were giving him cancer not curing it. How was it that they couldn’t cure him as they had cured so many other cancers with the Tibetan drug—the Chi Gompo—a powerfully effective anti-cancer agent ignored for centuries by the “civilized world” which scoffed at the simple combination of herbs and minerals dug out of the Tibetan Mountains by red-clad monks. Finally, after the cataclysm—the Great War—when millions were dying of cancer every month, the doctors, ready to try anything, experimented with the ancient brew of the shamans of Tibet, discovering to their astonishment that the cure for most cancers had been created by Gompo Rinpoche in the Sixteenth Century.

Why didn’t they get me the goddamn stuff, Vassily fumed. What was in those injections? Live cancer cells? A slow poison? Perhaps arsenic—something, yes. Killov couldn’t wait for the premier to die a natural death. No, he won’t leave me in peace. He’s too eager to destroy the world. He’s the one. He prayed again to his secret God. God, let me stop him—grant a dying man one request. Let me do this for mankind. Let Killov die before me; help me defeat him.

“Is something the matter, your excellency?” It was Ruwanda’s concerned voice. He had put down the tray, come over and caught the premier as he began sagging toward the floor.

“Yes, Ruwanda, help me to my desk.” He looked at the big broad nose, the ebony skin so flawless. “You, Ruwanda,” he said, slurring his words, “you are my only friend.”

“Not so, your excellency! The whole world loves you.”

“The truth, Ruwanda, is I am despised. But I am a good man, in relation to history. I will die and I will go wherever animate things go and I will have little to be ashamed of. I am the victim of my circumstances. It was my destiny to rule the world.”

“Your karma, your excellency,” Ruwanda said soothingly. “You are doing the best you can. You are trying to save the world.” Vassily sat heavily back into the chair; the African released his grip under the frail arm. The premier stared up at Ruwanda. “I’ll let you know a secret, Ruwanda—the doctors are poisoning me, Killov controls them.”

“You are imagining things, your excellency,” the black slave said. “No one wants you to die. It would be too great a loss.”

“Ruwanda?”

“Yes, excellency?”

“I don’t want my injection. Get me—get me some brandy. And then get me a priest.”

“But there are no priests; your excellency knows that. All religion is against the law. Your excellency is tired. He needs some rest. His mind is cloudy.”

“Then—then get me some sort of holy man. Call someone with
feelings
, Ruwanda. Feelings like me. I’m sick of all these cold, calculating assassins around me. Murdering doctors, ice-cold functionaries and statisticians. Get me a holy man!”

Ruwanda just stared at the frail old man. The premier ran his fingers through his hair—for a long time. He just sat, stroking the thinning, dark black, lightly greased hair. Then he said, “No, Ruwanda, you are right. I am foolish. There are no holy men in Russia. But there is something I must do. Tell my phone operator to adjust the transmitter to Top Secret Ultra Scramble. I want Zhabnov. President Zhabnov in Washington. I will save the world as the Earth wants me to. The only way I know how.”

“Yes, sir,” Ruwanda replied, heading off to notify the phone personnel. Vassily waited a few seconds for the circuits to be made and then lifted the red receiver from the desk. The satellite scramble disk turned on the roof as the radio waves were bounced off Satellite Communications Relay Five some ten thousand miles up and then back down to Washington, D.C.

It was five
A.M.
in Washington as the phone rang next to Zhabnov. He stirred restlessly as the young girls on either side of him poked him awake. Bleary eyed, the president picked it up, his heart pounding. Only one person would be calling him now. The little drugged girl stirred and smiled wanly from beneath the wet sheets.

“This is Vassily. Are you awake? Listen to me! Code Potemkin. You hear that? It’s in your personal code book. Do you understand me? This is a direct order from the premier. I know you will carry out your command. Code Potemkin.” He hung up, without waiting for a reply.

What the hell was Vassily talking about? What was going on? Zhabnov stumbled over to his bedroom safe and took out the Top Ultra Secret—for the eyes of the premier only—sealed, leather-bound command book. He stood naked by the night table, his huge stomach and small organ casting shadows from the table lamp. The president opened the book to Potemkin and read, “ELIMINATE KILLOV—HE IS A TRAITOR. IMMEDIATE TERMINATION WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE.”

Zhabnov slammed the book shut. Grandfather, he screamed silently. Thank you. Code Potemkin. Kill Killov. So now Vassily was directly allying himself with Zhabnov. That meant that not only was his presidency safe, but that the premier was grooming Zhabnov to take over. Yes, and between the two of them, surely they would be able to eliminate the Blackshirt leader. He was clever. But he was mortal!

At precisely 10:30
A.M.
the next day, Killov was walking in KGB Central, Denver with his omnipresent elite bodyguards—with their head-to-toe black leather uniforms, knee-high boots and submachine guns over their shoulders—on his way to a meeting on the Mind Breaker’s effectiveness. He saw Yablonski, one of his most trusted officers, walking toward him, smiling. Yablonski extended his hand, something he normally didn’t do. Killov saw it as Yablonski’s hand reached for his—a small, pointed object concealed in the palm of his hand. Yablonski’s smile turned into a grimace as he leaped forward. Killov lunged to the side at the last second and the dart plunged into a guard’s shoulder. Shellfish toxin. The guard slumped to the floor twitching, hands on his stomach as a thin trickle of blood seeped from his mouth and eyes. Killov’s guards surrounded Yablonski and knocked him to the ground.

“Don’t kill him!” Killov screamed. “Take him to the Mind Breaker.” Killov was shaken. He had thought he was in total control. Yet his own man had tried to kill him. That meant an organization at work to destroy him. Something that he knew nothing of. But Yablonski would talk when the white-hot needles plunged into his skull cavity. Yes, he would reveal everything. Killov glanced down at the corpse turning blue on the floor. He turned to another guard.

“Get rid of it,” he said, motioning to the body. The KGB colonel headed into the demonstration. Now they would have a very interesting subject indeed. And he had thought the day was going to be boring.

Twenty-Eight

T
he Expeditionary Force headed across burning plains for days. Only an occasional black-spiked cactus or a strange multicolored lizard would show itself from time to time. At last they reached the foothills of the next range of mountains. Groves of trees, cool shade and underground springs bubbling lusciously to the surface awaited them. They ran to the water holes, men and hybrids alike pushing aggressively for space to lap some of the precious liquid up. Then they lay back in the shade with a breeze coming down from the mountain ridges ahead of them.

“The one good thing about heat,” Chen said, lying flat on his back, his ninja suit sopping with cool spring water, “is that it feels so good when you hit the shade.”

“Is that the same as the thing about Red bullets is that they feel so good when they pry them out of you?” Detroit asked. Erickson began to set up a small kitchen for the approaching night. They would eat good this evening.

Rock got up early the next morning, refreshed from the first good night of sleep for days and left word with one of the guards, Slade, that the men should rest up and clean out their supplies. “Just take it easy,” he said with a grin, patting Slade on the shoulder. “I might not be back for up to a day. I’m scouting ahead. So just pull out the cards and rest.”

Rock headed through the thick woods up into the foothills of the looming range of mountains, some of which poked into the clouds. He was looking for a passage to the West. According to the old Esso map he carried with him wherever he went, they were in what had been eastern Utah and the range ahead was the Uinta Mountains. He pulled out his binoculars and sighted the sheer rock walls ahead. No way would the ’brids be able to traverse those.

Rock walked through the meadows and larger and larger hills as he approached the Uintas. The land was thick with trees, birds chirping, small creatures rustling through bushes. It was alive, Rock thought, breathing the afternoon fragrances of the bursting flowers as they opened their petals to the sun and the passing insect, offering draughts of nectar. It always brought a warm feeling to his gut to see life slowly building its way back from the pitted wasteland. In the middle of nothing, life fought back. Maybe it was stronger than death after all.

He finally reached the lower slopes of the closest mountain. From back a ways, it had appeared that there was a very narrow passageway between this and the next towering monument of dirt and rock. If there was a pass it would save them days. He climbed the mountain, which quickly became much steeper than it looked. After an ascent of nearly three hours, Rock reached the peak. The sun was just setting and it was spectacularly beautiful. Rock could see in every direction at once. The plains they had just crossed were an enormous emptiness, flat and dead. Then he swung his head 180 degrees to what lay ahead of them—more mists obscuring the terrain, thick and impenetrable, a blanket of pink and purple and yellowish fogs writhing and covering the land for hundreds of miles. What the hell was in there? Rock wondered. It wasn’t on Brady’s map. The sight of the hot zone into which Rock and his men would have to travel gave him a chill. It looked dead and cursed.

He headed south along the ridge of the long mountain until he reached its southern drop. There, far below, there was a way through. A narrow gully, probably once a river bed, had sliced through the base joining the two mountains. He took out his binoculars. A stone pathway, smooth, a good four feet wide—perfect. He couldn’t see a trace of lichen or any river life. The gully must have been carved long, long ago, perhaps in prehistoric times. He wondered if any of the American pioneers he had read about, in their treks to reach the West, had ever come across this same passage.

Rock started leisurely down the mountain, swinging back north. He knew he wouldn’t make camp until late, but he had traveled many times at night. The darkness was not an enemy. Not to Ted Rockson. Deer, startled, ran as he approached. A herd of them, thirty or forty. Rock wished he had his rifle.

They were running low on fresh food. He reached the base of the mountain around midnight. The crescent moon was rising over the pine-tipped hills, making them look furry, covered with a hide of needles and cones. Rock passed a large swamp. Frogs croaked madly as insect life filled the air with fleets of stinging, biting mosquitos, dragonflies, water bugs and other assorted life of the lower strata of the food chain.