The Darwin Elevator (59 page)

“Agreed. See you soon, then, Zane.”

“There’s one last thing.”

Skyler heard a tension in Zane’s voice.

Tania said, “We’re still here.”

“Russell Blackfield is alive.” Zane paused. When no one said anything, he continued. “We picked up a transmission from Gateway. A bleak situation back in Darwin, from the sound of it.”

“I see,” Tania said, a quiver in her voice. The room had fallen silent.

“You did what you had to,” Skyler said, loud enough for just her.

“Don’t … don’t say that.” She closed her eyes. “We’ll discuss it when I arrive, Zane. In the meantime, perhaps you could try to arrange a comm chat with the council?”

“I’m not sure there is a council anymore,” he said. “But we’ll work on it.”

The speaker went silent. Gradually the scientists began to exit the small control room, chatting among themselves.

“Skyler,” Tania said. Her voice had a sudden tone of authority that caught his attention.

“Yes?”

“I want you to explore the ground below, where the Elevator made landfall.”

The remaining people in the room stopped to listen.

“You’re an expert at finding things. Resourcefulness is your job.”

“
Was
my job,” he said. “But, you’re right. It makes sense.”

“When we reach New Gateway, you can take the climber down.”

He nodded. As Tania started to turn back to the monitor, he said, “Hold on …”

“Hmm?”

“What if this Elevator doesn’t protect against SUBS?”

She frowned at that. “Why wouldn’t it?”

Skyler shrugged. “I don’t think we should take anything for granted, after those … pods … went down.”

“Then it makes even more sense for you to go, since you’re immune.”

The statement drew some quizzical looks from those still in the room. Skyler ignored it. “Actually, no. Sending me won’t answer the question. I think someone else needs to come.”

“Someone to test the air.”

He gave a single, slow nod, letting the words sink in.

“Canary in a coal mine,” Tim muttered.

Tania’s mouth became a hard, thin line. “I can’t order anyone to do that.”

“Put out the word then,” Skyler said. “We need a volunteer.”

Chapter Forty-nine

Darwin, Australia

24.FEB.2283

His office in Nightcliff no longer felt comfortable. Russell paced it, grinding his teeth, waiting for the connection to be made. He’d been seconds away from boarding a climber for orbit when the request came.

His temper raged like a stormy sea. The damned woman had bested him. He could admit that. The idea that he would now have to beg was what churned his stomach.

Unless she simply wanted to gloat.

“I’ve almost got it,” said Kip, sitting at Russell’s terminal. “Yes. Connection established.”

“About time. Will I be able to see her?”

“Audio only,” Kip said, moving away from the desk.

“Figures,” Russell said. He wouldn’t be able to read her body language. The woman sure had a head on her shoulders. Russell vowed not to underestimate her anymore.

Taking a seat at his desk, he leaned in to the microphone. “This is Blackfield.”

“Hello, Russell.” Her voice sounded clear. Smooth, even. “Tania Sharma.”

He’d played this conversation in his mind since the scope of her betrayal had become clear. At the moment he couldn’t recall a word of it, and somehow that soothed him. He preferred to think on his feet.

“You sound good,” he offered. “Well fed.”

“If we could please discuss—”

“I’m fine,” he said. “Thanks for asking. I do appreciate the farm you sent while I vacationed in Africa, but I’m afraid it didn’t survive reentry.”

Silence from her end. She wouldn’t be goaded, it seemed. Russell wondered who sat with her now, coaching her. More than that, he wondered where the hell she was.

“Your other bomb missed, by the way.”

“What do you mean?” To her credit, she sounded confused.

Russell turned in his chair, his gaze settling on the plume of smoke rising from Darwin’s old downtown. “They say the explosion rattled the entire city. Nightcliff was unharmed. I assume that was your target. Lucky for you it landed outside the Aura, or you’d have a lot more innocent blood on your hands.”

Total silence. The damned woman had nothing to say.

“Well,” Russell said. “You called me. What’s on your mind, little lady?”

“I thought we might come to an arrangement.”

“An arrangement?” He snorted back a laugh. “That’s what’s on your mind? I thought it might be all the people you’re starving to death.”

Another pause. The silence went on so long, Russell thought perhaps the connection had been lost.

Across the room, Kip shifted uncomfortably on his feet. Russell had forgotten he was still in the room, and he jerked his head toward the door. The man left in a hurry.

Tania spoke. “We have a proposal—”

“How about this. Send the farms back, all of them, and I won’t hunt you down and strangle you.”

“Please, Russell. There’s no time for this.” Her voice, dammit, still sounded calm.

With a concerted effort he swallowed his rage. He realized that she had said “arrangement.” Knowing what she needed would tell a lot of her situation. “Fine, then, what do you want?”

“I’ll be blunt, Mr. Blackfield.”

“Good.”

“We have food. You have people.”

People. Not air, not water. Not even supplies. People.

They must have another elevator, then. At least that hadn’t been a lie.

“I’m listening,” he said.

“We propose a simple trade.”

She kept using the word
we
. Russell found that interesting. “Go ahead.” Letting her blather on, to his surprise, was proving useful.

“It’s quite simple, really. We will send containers of food to Gateway, where they will be unloaded. You will then return them with people aboard.”

“How much food?” he asked. “How many people?”

A pause followed. He imagined her sitting in a tin can somewhere, arguing with her fellow scientists; this was the first time any of them had tasted power. He wondered how soon it would corrupt. Perhaps it already had.

“A container holds roughly three tons of food. In exchange for each, we want forty people.”

A litany of thoughts shouted for his attention. He felt a headache coming on, and wondered where the nearest bottle was. “You’d better be sending a lot of them. I’ve got a city to feed, not to mention the bloody Orbitals.”

“If you supply empty containers, that won’t be a problem,” she said. “Do we have a deal?”

“Which people? Will random idiots from the outer slums do?”

“We’ve prepared a list.”

Of course you have
. “Should I send them in shackles?” The words tumbled out, and silence followed. If he’d crossed a line so be it—the words felt good.

“I’m very aware of the distasteful nature of this, Mr. Blackfield. The list is short. Beyond those, we want volunteers in good health.”

He snorted. “And the males, well-endowed perhaps? You could start a harem for your little play kingdom. Or do you prefer women? I’m a little unclear on that point. I’d ask your assistant, but the last I saw her she was being annihilated—blown to smithereens—by, well, you.”

Tania went quiet again. It occurred to him that she hadn’t even asked about Natalie. Or anyone else, for that matter.

Russell already knew he would agree to her demands. He did need the food, after all, and the arrogant woman was offering him the perfect opportunity to send spies into her midst. Surely she must know that, but what choice did she have?

As she’d said, she needed people.

Russell would have no problem mustering an endless parade of brigands and idiots to send. He had a monopoly on that.

“Fine,” he said. “Let’s talk details.”

Chapter Fifty

Belém, Brazil

26.FEB.2283

Fifty meters above the Earth, the climber car slowed to a crawl, exactly as programmed. At twenty meters it would halt altogether and Skyler would finally be able to open the hatch. This simple climber car had no external camera, and just one small porthole window through which he could see only cloud-filled sky and endless rain forest.

He checked his equipment again, though he knew everything was ready. He’d gone over it a half-dozen times during the long trip down from New Gateway. Nervous energy coursed through him, relentless and distracting. The only thing that seemed to quell it was the tightening of straps, the adjustment of buckles. Busywork.

Skyler glanced at his volunteer companion, Karl Stromm. He wanted to inspect the man’s environment suit once more. Karl had waved him off the last time, and he looked almost annoyed now. He had every right.

“Almost time,” Skyler said.

Karl just nodded. Soon he would risk his life, or sanity, by opening that suit—an act of bravery he’d been quick to accept.

“He’s one of the men Neil trained in secret. A former firefighter, I think. He organized the mutiny on Anchor,” Tania had explained. With a grin she had added, “You’ll get along fine.”

The climber car lurched and came to a stop. A moment of unsettling silence passed before the small light by the hatch turned from red to green.

The bare-bones vehicle had no windows or monitors like the ones that regularly made the trip along the Darwin cord. Skyler could only hope the altitude sensors had done their job.

Skyler moved to the handle and grasped it. “Ready?”

“Let’s get it over with,” Karl said, voice tinny through the speaker on his helmet.

The man carried himself with a natural calm. The disposition reminded him of Jake, and Skyler found reassurance there.

With a grunt he pulled the locking arm aside, grasped the inner handle, and turned it in a half circle. Air hissed as the pressure equalized. A line of sunlight appeared and grew, soon filling the cramped cabin.

Heavy, warm air brought with it the rich smells of wild vegetation. Skyler inhaled it deeply. In the last few weeks, between Darwin and then space, he’d forgotten the simple pleasure of breathing fresh air.

As the hatch swung away, Skyler found himself facing south. A wide and fast river rushed by, east to west. Freshwater, then, and close.
Not a bad start,
he thought.

On the far bank, a thick green marshland stretched out for miles. Farther west, lush hills gave way to mountains. To the east he saw a blanket of lush forest canopy, marred only by a smoke plume a few kilometers away. Too big to be a campfire. Fallen debris from the destroyed climber, he guessed. Skyler inched up to the opening and poked his head out to look below.

He froze, mesmerized by what he saw.

“Tell me,” Karl said, behind him.

Skyler searched for words, and found none. The elevator made landfall in the middle of what was once some sort of business park, or school. The area around the cord had been leveled by the elevator’s arrival, but it wasn’t empty.

Jutting out of that land, at perfectly spaced intervals, were buildings. Alien buildings.

“There’s a … city,” Skyler finally managed to say.

“Belém. Why are you whispering?”

“Not Belém,” Skyler said. “The Builders.”

The surface of the matte black structures resembled the flower ship, so high above. Skyler realized they might not be buildings at all. He saw no entrances or windows. Just solid masses, arranged in concentric squares around the cord of the Elevator. The ones near the outer edge were ten meters tall, and toward the center, at least thirty meters. No two had quite the same footprint, though the shapes were similar enough that Skyler sensed they all had a shared purpose.

At the base of the cord itself, where a crater should be, Skyler saw a huge black disk with notches all around its edge. It looked like a big gear, lying on its side.

Karl moved behind Skyler, trying to look over his shoulder. His breathing came in loud, excited bursts. “Do you see any … any of
them
?”

Skyler shook his head. Other than birds, and swarms of insects, he saw no signs of life. “Let’s drop the ladder and have a look.”

For fifteen minutes they walked in silence, exploring the alien structures. The more Skyler saw, the more he thought of it as an outpost rather than a city.

It consisted of perhaps two hundred structures. More than the number of “pods” that had raced down the cord from space.

“No sign of the Builders,” he said, to himself as much as Karl.

“Automated construction,” the other man said. “Like the Elevator.”

For what purpose, Skyler could not imagine. He stepped close to one and studied the material. The elegant, faceted walls were laced with fine, geometric patterns, all straight lines and right angles in a chaotic mix. The grooves varied in depth from the barest hint to as much as a centimeter, just like the iris he’d found below Nightcliff. “I can’t wait until Tania sees this.”

Karl managed a chuckle. “Not just her, the whole lot of them. They’ll be tripping over each other to study this.”

They surveyed the entire area. With each step, Skyler felt his sense of wonder fade. He reminded himself of the work to be done. Because of the alien structures, there would be no room to build around the base, making construction of a climber port tricky.

The human city of Belém waited beyond like an overgrown fruit tree, Skyler thought, just begging to be exploited. Supplies could be harvested from there for years before needing to explore farther out. And even then, the Americas were wholly untapped since the disease had struck the world. None of the scavengers in Darwin could range this far. His mind reeled at the possibilities.

“We’re going to be busy,” Karl said.

“I feel,” Skyler said, “like a colonist.”

The other man grunted. “Near enough the truth.”

Skyler studied the edge of Belém more closely. He’d seen a hundred cities like it in his forays into the Clear and found himself noting which structures might provide valuable resources, and which could be inhabited. Hospitals, hotels, and warehouses topped his list. He wondered belatedly if there were any airports close by.