Overture (Earth Song) (53 page)

“
That’s enough,” his senior noncom said, turning the rifle around and aiming it at him.

“
This is a trap, don’t you see? We were led here by people I thought were on my side. Those crazies down there are nothing more than a distraction! Why do you think they launched those flares? We have to get the hell out of here.”

“
You’re a lunatic,” the man said simply, “I’m only sorry I didn’t realize it in time to save the thousands who have died needlessly in the last few days.”

“
Fuck you, I’m getting out of here right-” The crack of a .223 round was instantly followed by a shooting pain in his thigh. He yelled and fell to the ground. “Motherfucker!” he screamed and tried to staunch to flow of bright red blood. “I’ve been hit five times in the line of duty, but never by my own men.” As hard as he squeezed, the blood kept coming. He realized it was probably his femoral, which meant he was probably dead. “What do you expect to accomplish by this?” The other men all watched with their eyes wide and mouths hanging open. His senior aide had the look of grim determination that Hipstitch had seen on many enemies he’d faced over the years, enemies who made the decision that their own lives were the price of obtaining a goal.

“
You need to wait here.”

“
For what?” Hipstitch snarled through clenched teeth. The pool of blood under him grew steadily and he could hear the sound of turbine engines and the thumping of rotor blades approaching. He looked up wildly, realizing how exposed their position was. “We need to get off the street; helicopters are coming in on those flares!”

“
That’s what I figured when they popped them, sir.” Hipstitch tried to stand but just before he got to his feet his femur snapped with a sickening pop. Already damaged by the bullet wound, it wouldn’t support his massive weight. He screamed and fell back to the filthy street.

Above
them a pair of Comanche attack choppers appeared and swept over the street, their pilots taking stock of the situation below. They screamed by and then executed flipping turns to come back again. Hipstitch watched through his fading sight as the attack chopper lined up with the street and bore down on them. The noncom closed his eyes and lowered his head with a small smile on his face. One of the men ran but the others just dropped their weapons and waited. The singing of the surviving fanatics reached a crescendo just as the helicopters opened fire.

Mindy looked up from the computer she was holding just after the Portal closed. A little more than two hours and sixty of their number were through. A short time ago, there had been a gun battle between the Portal military defenders and a squadron of attack choppers. The defenders didn’t know they weren’t protecting military leaders any more. It reminded them all that time was short. Their actions took on an additional sense of urgency. “Nice of the guards to defend the base and thus allow us to escape right under their noses.”

“
They probably wouldn’t return the sentiment,” Billy said from behind her.

“
Sorry, didn’t think anyone would hear my mental musings.”

“
It’s okay, really, most of us are aware of how deep this little action of civil disobedience goes. It’s survival of the fittest, and it looks like the brains have won over brawn for a change. The meek shall inherit the Earth.”

“
Or Bellatrix, in this case,” she said and he looked at her with a wry grin

The
Portal closed several minutes ago without another person going through. Mindy turned her attention to see why there was a delay and had to spend several minutes easing a dispute over several pieces of relatively unimportant equipment. Finally, the next person went through, the last of the women, and the crates they were arguing over followed close behind.

“
Let’s keep it moving,” Mindy called over the diminishing crowd, “we don’t know how long before Hipstitch will be showing up.”

“
He won’t be showing up,” said a new voice. It was Leo Skinner being escorted in by a pair of burly police officers. He looked considerably less out of sorts than his colleague, Dr. Osgood, who was now shaking his head and talking to himself.

“
Welcome, Leo!” Mindy cried and ran down to meet him.

“
You won’t be so cordial when you hear what I have to say.”

“
Why? And what happened to Hipstitch?”

“
He’s dead.”

“
Well that at least is no surprise,” Billy said with a snort. “Killed by his own command, no doubt.”

“
No, killed by me if you really must know.” The police and remaining men from the Portal Project were too busy to hear the conversation but Mindy, Billy and Osgood all jerked their heads around to stare at the smiling astronomer. “He’d served his purpose.”

“
Oh, God,” Osgood said and pointed at his colleague, “you’re the one? You’re the one Hipstitch was afraid of, the one who arranged all this?”

“
You really thought that fat old grunt was capable of orchestrating all this, did you?”

“
But you said you found out through your security clearance at NASA,” Mindy said.

“
I did, but not by accident. I’m on the Alpha Prime team.”

Mindy
shook her head. “The team that would be contacted in the event of an alien landing? I thought that was all bullshit.”

“
It was real, back in the 90s’, but it was disbanded just after the millennium. Through some quirk of fate the e-mail contact tree was still intact. I found out about this little beauty within hours of its arrival. Being a political insider with NASA and the NSA for decades has given me lots of friends, friends in high places, and friends who would pay anything to survive.”

“
You would barter with the only way off the planet?” Mindy asked incredulously.

“
I’ve bartered for the survival of the space program with the US government and and other power hungry assholes for years on end. This was just my chance to turn the tables for once. Now it was me with the power, it was me with the big gun. Oh, they lined up to do whatever I asked them to. From murders to money, all I had to do was send off an e-mail. But this,” he said and gestured at all the men working busily, “this was the last thing I expected from you! You were going, I’d made up my mind already, so why all this?”

“
All this? I’m trying to save some people.”

“
So was I, what’s wrong with getting a little bit extra in the deal?”

“
The difference is I’m bringing along the stuff we need to survive, not whatever makes the paying customers happy.”

“
Many of my customers probably won’t make it because of this ill-timed intervention by the legitimate government, but that’s just as well. They were all assholes anyway. But I have to thank you, really.”

“
Why would you thank me? We’ve taken the Portal and are sending our own choice of people over.”

“
Because you sent all those women and children first, that was a stroke of brilliance even I didn’t think of. But right now the game is over.” He reached into his pants pocket and retrieved a handgun.

Billy
laughed in his face. “You going to stop all of us with that one little pea shooter?” It didn’t go unnoticed as two police officers appeared out of nowhere, weapons drawn and held in a two-handed grip.

“
Oh, I wouldn’t dream of it,” Leo said with a shrug, “that’s what I have all those expensive friends for.” Outside the dome the roar of helicopter rotors and the scream of powerful jet engines appeared out of nowhere.

“
Helicopters!” screamed one of the cops from a doorway.

“
At least a dozen of them!” agreed another. All work came to a halt as the men looked around with panic in their eyes.

“
Let’s make a run for it,” Billy said, “just shoot that old fart and run through the Portal!”

Mindy
looked at the massive pile of equipment, then at the portal. A lot of essential materials had been moved over, but it was mostly the big bulky stuff like computer mass storage arrays and solar powered equipment. The true long-term survival gear was still there in smaller crates that would be easier to match up with the heavier men.

“
Let’s just kill him,” another officer said.

“
I wouldn’t do that,” Leo said and held up a tiny radio, “one press of this button and they will chew this place to pieces.”

“
You’ll rupture the Portal,” Mindy warned him, “just like New Delhi!”

He
glanced at the dais with the slightest hint of concern on his face, but then he seemed to think about something else. “A few million tons of rock will be here in hours, young lady, I’ll chance it. If I don’t get to go, none of you do.”

“
Can’t we make some kind of a deal, Leo?” Mindy asked. “I mean, that’s what it’s all about, right? Let some of these people go, the husbands and parents of the kids and women already over there, and take this equipment that’s set up. Trust me; it’s a lot better than the shit you were going to take.”

“
Oh, I will take your equipment,” he said after glancing at some of the labels, “you have exceptional tastes. But as for the people, I’m afraid I can’t agree. You see those husbands and fathers are related to those kids and wives. My hand-chosen men out there are of a different genetic background and mating them with those women and kids will insure our survival as a species.” There were shouts and howls from the men as several more weapons were now pointed at him. His finger tightened on the button and Mindy screamed for them to hold their fire. “The game is over, how it ends is ultimately up to you.”

She
looked from him to all the people standing around her. She saw the looks of fear on their faces and she also saw the looks of hope they cast in her direction. Billy’s face was the most telling. He smiled weakly and lowered his gun. “The fate of the planet is bigger than any one person,” she said and hung her head in resignation. “Everyone put your guns down.”

“
That’s a good girl,” Leo said with a viscous smile, “I knew I could count on you.”

“
We can take this idiot,” the black police officer said, refusing to lower his gun.

“
Yeah,” agreed another cop, “I ain’t letting him go fuck my wife and little girl! Let’s us just all make a run for the Portal thing!”

“
You will give it up if you care about the human race,” she told them all loudly. They all started yelling and she screamed at the top of her lungs. They all fell silent again. “This is about more than us; it’s the whole damned human race. We don’t know if anyone else around the planet got off or not. For all we know those seventy odd people over there are it. Our last chance to survive. If we let this opportunity fail, well, I don’t know why the aliens bothered giving it to us.”

“
It’s disgusting!” said one of the members from her own team.

“
It is, but there is more to it. All this stuff in these boxes is essential, more essential than us. A lot more essential. Emotional responses aside, without this equipment no one will survive on Bellatrix beyond a few years. And if they do, they will be reduced to little better than cavemen. This is more than pure survival. In those crates is our society, our laws, our history, our technology, and our hope for a future beyond scratching the dirt to survive. It is absolutely essential to our future on Bellatrix. We, however, are not.”

“
She’s right,” Billy said, “you’ve got to see it as well, all of you.”

One
by one, they lowered their guns. Defeat was not an easy thing for a man to accept, and being beaten by a balding overweight astronomer didn’t make it any easier. However, her speech worked and even the proudest among them saw the truth of it. In a moment all the guns were down.

“
Excellent,” Leo said and holstered his own weapon. “Now, if everyone will be so kind as to line up against this side of the dome? Wonderful.” He put the radio to his lips. “This is Skinner, clear to land. I have the situation under control. The first choppers to land disgorged a dozen soldiers all armed with assault rifles and in no particular uniform. Some wore civilian garb but all of them had the look of determination that comes from a deep inner purpose. Mindy knew right away that these people could kill with little or no remorse. “If you will keep an eye on these people while I start evaluating what we have here,” Leo told the new arrivals. Mindy's people were disarmed and herded to one side where a pair of armed guards took charge from that point.

Leo
walked along the formidable stack of crates making mental notes on what he was finding. After the first two stacks he took out a felt tip marker and started drawing wide slash marks through the labels on some of them. Mindy realized he was deciding what was going and what wasn’t. As the other helicopters all found places to land and the crews began to show up, he ordered the discarded cases moved to one side to make room as other new crates were brought in. She felt her heart sink as more and more pieces of equipment or goods that her team decided was absolutely essential were replaced with unknown items. “What have I done?” she wondered aloud.