Текст книги "Hollow World"

Автор книги: Michael J. Sullivan

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Geo-1 looked incredulous. “Nuclear explosives? What the bleez?”

“Honestly, I haven’t taken the time to ask. Figure we can do that later over antique cocktails.”

“Good enough,” Geo-1 said. “Prometheus! Wake up, old lady!”

“You know I don’t sleep,” a powerful voice boomed, and Ellis was certain that if the planet itself could speak, this was how it would sound.

“Prometheus, we have a problem here.”

Ellis couldn’t help thinking he was watching a live-action remake of Apollo 13. All around, people rushed with purpose, grabbing hazard suits and pulling them on. No panic, no fear visible. He and Pax could have been in a firehouse watching the men suit up and slide down the pole.

“I have been monitoring the situation,” Prometheus’s powerful voice boomed.

“If you would be so kind, please punch us to Full-Core. It’s time to make sure everyone is awake.”

“Announcing Full Core,” Prometheus said, and an alarm echoed. The sound inside the control room was muffled. But Ellis also felt a rumble as something large was moved, although he couldn’t see what.

“We’ve got at least one and possibly two more explosives to locate,” Geo-1 shouted. “Everyone not crucial, hit the portways. The rest I want remote-tracking. Keep your cons open for information about locations. Report the moment you find something.”

“What can we do?” Pax asked Geo-3.

“Stay out of the way and let us do our job.”

“Is this really just another typical day for you?” Ellis asked.

Geo-3 grinned. “Oh, the stories I could tell.”

Ellis and Pax had climbed up one tier of stairs to the second-floor stations and stood near the rail, which kept them out of traffic. The elevation made it easier to watch the Jumbotron, as they didn’t need to crane their necks so far. They stood holding on to the balcony rail, watching the big monitor as the purple cloud dwindled and disappeared.

A cheer filled the command center, but it was brief, as there were still two more to eject.

“I never knew it was like this down here,” Pax said. “It’s so scary—exciting, but scary. The rest of Hollow World has no idea. We show geomancers respect and all—revere them, observe Geomancer Day—but I don’t think anyone above us has a clue why. Until you actually come here and see it—you can’t really know.”

“That’s one gone,” Geo-1 told them, climbing up the stairs. “And a team near Amethyst Ring says they have a lock on the second. They’re moving to eject it now. But there’s been no sign of the third. Are you sure there were three?”

“They were working on the third when I left,” Ellis said. “Having trouble with the timer. It’s possible they couldn’t get it to work at all. The bombs are pretty old.”

“About as old as you.”

Ellis was wondering why Geo-1 never asked who or what he was. Most Hollow World residents gawked. The geomancers didn’t seem to notice.

“You know me?”

“Can’t go anywhere without hearing about Ellis Rogers. You’re as popular as the last tank of air at the bottom of the sea. So I’m old—real old, and these bombs are older than I am. Where’d they come from?”

“Museum of War in Jerusalem.”

“Makes sense, but those warheads wouldn’t be live. The radioactive materials would have been removed.”

“They obviously managed to rearm them.”

Geo-1 nodded. “So there might not be a third to deal with?”

“I don’t know.”

“I hope not.” Geo-1 looked up at the screens. “Cause we can’t find it. And that disturbs me.”

Ellis imagined it took an awful lot to disturb Geo-1.

“How long do we have?” Ellis asked.

“Thirty minutes, and I—”

Geo-1 stopped, eyes darting about the way people do when listening to a sports broadcast on earphones. “Fantastic! I don’t need to remind you we’re in a race here, right?” There was a pause. “Good work!” Geo-1 looked up and grinned. “We got it. Right outside in the Sea of Gehenna portway—just appeared on the readout. Delta team is on it.”

“Did you say it just appeared?” Ellis asked.

“Yep. Must have just ported it in.” Geo-1 fixed Ellis with a crushing stare. The face was that of a twenty-something, but the eyes were old, and hard as those of a salt-leached sailor. “And you’re positive there were only three?”

“That’s what I was told and what I saw.”

“Okay then, looks like we have this.”

Ellis wanted to check the time, but the battery of his cellphone had finally died. He wished he still wore a watch.

“Could I use one of your Makers?” Pax asked.

Geo-1 pointed. “Third floor.”

“Does it have a standard menu?”

“It’s custom—but it has the basics too.”

“Thanks.” Pax took Ellis by the hand and led him up to the third floor, where they found a small bank of industrial-designed Makers in various sizes, each connected to an auto-feed gravel chute. One was the size of a walk-in freezer with huge double doors that would have been roomy enough to summon a Buick. A hand wave from Pax made one of the smaller countertop models light up.

“Antique watches,” Pax said.

A panel came to life and displayed a series of 3-D timepieces that rotated in midair. They were projected images but looked solid, as if he could pluck one up. Ellis saw complicated diver’s watches, digital ones, diamond-encrusted bracelet pieces, multicolored plastic ones, pocket watches, even an original Ingersoll Mickey Mouse with a leather band.

“Have a preference?” Pax asked.

“A digital.” Ellis pointed when Pax didn’t understand.

Pax selected the watch pattern. A flash occurred and a bing. Pax opened the door and handed Ellis the watch from the image. It felt warm and blinked 12:00. He played with the buttons, discovering the watch had a timer before he worked out how to set it, which he did according to the displayed Hollow World core time. If what Warren told him was accurate, they had seventeen minutes. Ellis set a countdown running. Then they returned to their perch.

“Pax,” Ellis said, “how did you know I wanted a watch?”

Pax shrugged. “You just looked like you did.”

“Seriously? You thought I lookedlike I wanted a watch.”

“Well you must have, right?”

“And how did you knowI didn’t kill Geo-24 when we first met? Did I just lookinnocent?”

“I’ve told you…I’m an arbitrator and a good judge of character.”

“But you also knew the Geomancer’s phrase about the sky is falling.”

Pax smiled uncomfortably.

“You learned that from your first meeting with Geo-24, didn’t you? During that conversation on Miracles Day, right? Only I’ll bet Geo-24 never told you.”

“I don’t know what—”

“You probably said something that Geo-24 picked up on. You made a mistake because you were flustered and starstruck. You slipped and Geo-24, being trained to detect even tiny anomalies, noticed. That’s why Geo-24 was researching you. I bet your record was extraordinary. All those people you helped, like Vin. No one else could do anything. Even the ISP was helpless when Vin continued to scoop out pair after pair of eyes with a spoon. But you were able to save them all, weren’t you? Able to understand, to feel their pain.”

“Understanding and helping people is what arbitrators do.”

“But your skill goes beyond understanding, doesn’t it? You found out the code phrase from Geo-24, just like you found out about Ren from Pol. You tried to warn me about them. You knew what they were going to do.”

“No. No.” Pax’s head shook. “I didn’t know about all this. If I had—”

“You’re right. You didn’t know…until you found me at Firestone Farm. I was telling you how we had to leave, and then you brought up how they were going to concreteHollow World.”

Pax looked frightened, drawing away from him. “Ellis Rogers, please, don’t—”

Below them the command room erupted in surprise as someone dressed in a full hazard suit entered, dragging another behind. The moment they cleared the tunnel Ellis could see the streak of blood the limp body trailed across the floor.

“People are with the bomb!” the member of Delta team who was standing said as others rushed to help the bleeder. “There was this series of loud pops, and 884 fell. I felt a pain in my…in my…” The team member collapsed. As he did, Ellis saw a small hole through the suit near the shoulder.

“Warren,” Ellis told Pax. “He’s guarding the bomb.”

“Send Beta and Alpha teams in to—” Geo-1 started to say.

“Don’t send anyone else!” Ellis shouted from above as he and Pax scrambled down the stairs to the cluster surrounding the wounded geomancers. “He’ll kill anyone who comes close.”

“Who’s he?” Geo-1 asked.

“Warren Eckard.”

“Another Darwin?”

“Yes. He has a gun and will shoot anyone coming near. He must have discovered we’re spacing the other bombs and intends to make certain this one goes off. He’ll probably wait until the last second and then port out.”

“Can you—can Prometheus create a portway to the bomb?” Pax asked. “Isolate it?”

Geo-1 nodded. “But it won’t help. Portways are tunnels with open ends. When the explosion goes off, half the force will blow back through here, ripping GI apart.”

“Like the barrel of a gun,” Ellis said. He glanced at his new watch: 00:14:53.“I’m going to need a Port-a-Call.”

“I’ve got one,” Pax said firmly. “And yes, I know what you’re thinking—and no, that’s not going to happen unless you shoot me dead. And yes, you’re right, we don’t have time to argue. So let’s go.”

“Promise to admit to me how you do that, and you can come.”

“I’ll tell you anything you want to know if we live through this.”

“Deal.”

“You might want to have everyone evacuate,” Pax said.

“Yeah.” Ellis nodded.

Geo-1 turned to Geo-3. “Call it. Purge Hollow World—everyone to the surface.”

“I hope they still remember the drill,” Geo-3 said.

“In fifteen minutes, if we’re all still here, you’ll know if we were successful. If not…”

“What are you going to do?” Geo-1 asked.

Ellis drew out the pistol. It felt cold. “Stop him.”

 

Chapter Fourteen

Time’s Up

Ellis refused to wear a suit. It would take time, but more importantly it would hide who he was. Warren thought nothing of shooting “the baldies,” but he might think twice about shooting him.

For all his bravado, Ellis really didn’t expect to kill Warren. It wouldn’t come to that. If he absolutely had to, Ellis would just wing him, shoot him in the arm or leg and kick his gun away like they did in the westerns he and Warren had grown up watching. He remembered how the digital watch had blinked 12:00 just before he set the time—high noon—the traditional time for a showdown gunfight.

Warren wouldn’t really shoot me, would he?

The Warren Eckard he knew in 2014 wouldn’t, but this was Master Ren. Something fundamental had happened to him in that cabin in the woods. That experience had changed his friend, profoundly. For one, it got him to read the Bible, and Ellis hadn’t imagined anything would ever do that. Somewhere in those pages he had found permission to beat and kill. Warren had developed calluses on more than just his hands.

With the clock reading 00:12:53, Ellis and Pax stepped out into the portway tunnel that crossed the molten Sea of Gehenna. An eerie silence—just a faint hum that came from the stream of portals. Sound didn’t pass through the barrier any more than water, heat, or the vacuum of space. This was good, because they were walking through a bubbling ocean of rock, and he was pretty sure at this distance both of them would have already evaporated.

“Stay behind me,” he told Pax.

The tunnel ran in a straight line, and even in the brilliance of the Sea of Gehenna, Ellis thought he could see two wavering objects in the distance, like cars on the horizon of a sunbaked highway. This was the apocalyptic hellscape he’d been expecting, but he had never thought that he and Warren would be the two road warriors facing off.

Maybe it wasn’t Warren at all. Maybe Pol was there, or Dex, or Hig, but Ellis couldn’t imagine Warren giving his gun to anyone. Still, they might have all left by now. Maybe Delta team had caught Warren just as they were wheeling the bomb through, and, after shooting, they had jumped back through the portal to Firestone Farm. The bomb might just be sitting there ticking. And maybe Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny shared a condo in Tampa—and maybe Isley didn’t kill himself, and Peggy didn’t become an alcoholic because I’m a selfish ass. Maybewas just a convenient shield to hide behind when realityproved to be a bitch.

Reality’s bitchiness didn’t let Ellis down. As they got closer, he could see the white plastic crate; beside it stood Warren. He was alone, dressed in a radiation suit, but the hood and gloves were off and lying on the ground in front of him. He was busy fumbling with something and didn’t notice their approach.

“Goddammit!” Warren cursed at the thing in his hands. “Fucking piece of shit.”

Ellis kept the gun in front of him, cupped for firing just as he’d been taught, but he aimed the barrel at the ground. In his mind, he imagined he looked like one of those dashing detectives rushing up a New York City stairwell. In reality, he felt sick and was sweating so hard he wondered if the heat really was leaking through the tunnel.

“Warren,” Ellis said, his voice a little shaky.

Warren’s head jerked up. As it did, Ellis saw the Port-a-Call in his hands.

Fear flashed on Warren’s face, then confusion, and finally a nod. “Well, if it isn’t Mr. Rogers.”

“I told you I wasn’t going to let you do it. And I found my gun. Move away from the bomb.” Ellis looked for Warren’s rifle, but didn’t see it. “We’ve neutralized the other bombs you placed. All five of them.”

Warren narrowed his eyes, then laughed. “Nice try, but you’re lying. We only ever had the three.”

“Thanks for confirming that,” Ellis said, and watched as it took a second for Warren to scowl. Then Ellis raised the barrel of the gun a bit. “Now back up. I don’t want to shoot you, but I will if I have to.”

“You’d shoot me? You’d fucking shoot me? I’m your best friend, Ellis. I protected you in school. I got you your first real job. I loaned you the money for your first car. I was the best man at your goddamn wedding! And you’re gonna shoot me? No fucking way.”

“To save millions of people—you’re damn right.”

“They aren’t people. You and I are the last real humans, Ellis. All these others”—he pointed at Pax—“are an abomination—test-tube sideshow freaks. This is our one chance to fix it. Don’t you see? That’s why we were sent here. That’s why God chucked us through time. He needed our help in putting His world back together. God needs us to kill off these abominations so that His real children can fulfill the scriptures. You have to be able to see that.”

Ellis shook his head, taking slow steps forward. He wanted to close the distance in case he did have to shoot. He wasn’t a good shot. He’d only fired the gun a few times. He’d managed to hit Hal because he was at point-blank range. Warren probably wouldn’t let him get that close. “I have a problem anytime anyone uses killand Godin the same sentence.”

“That’s because you haven’t read the Bible. God– the real God, not the liberal-bullshit-hippie God—is like a Mafia boss. The God of the Bible ordered killings all the time. Ordered his number one follower—Abraham—to kill his own son. Talk about some messed-up shit. Then He had Moses slaughter all those Egyptians and the others who were on the wrong side when he came down the mountain—they changed that scene for the movie The Ten Commandments, but it happened. And God ordered Joshua to take out Jericho—killed a whole city, every man, woman, and child slaughtered. Why? To make room for His chosen people. And that’s what I’m doing. That’s what God wants usto do.”

“Not today.” Ellis took a step forward. “Now back up—I mean it, Warren.”

“Shoot him,” Pax said.

Ellis was shocked. Pax’s tone was dead serious. More than serious—earnest. Remembering how Pax had reacted to the last shooting, he couldn’t understand. “ What?”

“He has a pistol,” Pax spoke quickly. “Tucked in the belt of his pants behind his back. It’s his little Sig P245, the one he never told you about because he bought it when he decided to rob Olson’s Liquor over on Fenkle. Ford was on strike, and Kelly was whining about money. He hid the gun for years. Only now he’s going to pull it out and shoot you with it.”

“Warren?” Ellis stared across the length of the golden tunnel at his friend.

“He thinks you can’t be trusted anymore,” Pax went on. “He thinks you’ve been brainwashed by us—by me especially. He’s thinking I’m controlling you right now like a puppet master. Maybe we did something to you when we operated on your heart and lungs—put something in your brain, a chip perhaps. Yeah—that has to be it. The fuckers put a goddamn chip in Ellis’s brain, and now they control the poor bastard. He’s a zombie for them now. Holy fuck! How is that freak—that fucker is reading my goddamn mind! Saying out loud everything I’m thinking as I fucking think it! Oh shit! Oh shit! Sorry, Ellis—Jesus, man! I really hate to do this, but if there is any of you left in there, you know I have to. Goodbye, buddy.”

Warren twisted, reaching around behind him.

“Shoot him! Shoot him now!” Pax yelled.

Ellis flipped off the safety. He could do this. He took aim at Warren’s left thigh and pulled the trigger. He was rushed, frightened, and the instant he pulled that trigger, he knew he’d missed.

Squeeze the trigger. Don’t pull it!

That’s what the instructor had said at the gun range; that’s what the instruction manual had indicated too. Take a deep breath, let a little out, hold it, and very slowly, gently, squeezethe trigger.

Maybe that worked on a gun range where they had nice earmuffs and nonthreatening targets with concentric circles. Things were a tad different when you were standing near a ticking H-bomb in a transparent corridor over a lake of lava, and your best friend was about to blow your head off because he thought you were a zombie.

The gun shoved Ellis back, his arms popping up like they had last time. He needed to bring the gun down, take better aim, and shoot again before—

Ellis hadn’t missed. He could tell because Warren jerked.

There was a hole in the center of Warren’s radiation suit. Not in his thigh, but in his chest. If Warren had been one of those silhouette targets at the range, Ellis would have scored a perfect bull’s eye. His oldest friend glared at him, shocked. He tried to speak, the mumbled gasp drowned mostly by the echo of the gunshot. Knees buckled, and Warren crumpled face-forward to the floor of the tunnel.

Ellis didn’t understand.

What just happened?

He stood frozen, looking at Warren, confused.

I didn’t kill him. I couldn’t havekilled him.

Ellis expected Warren to get up even though he knew he wasn’t going to.

Warren can’t be dead. I aimed for his leg! I aimed for his leg!

Pax had the Port-a-Call out and jogged forward.

A portal leading to a star field of open space appeared inside the corridor. The conflicting energy of the portal in a portal created a rainbow of colors that sparked like a Tesla coil. From the wide eyes of Pax, Ellis could tell the light show was unexpected. Still, Pax had the presence of mind to shout back at Ellis, “Hurry! We need to roll this through.”

He looked at his watch. The glowing blue numbers read: 00:3:48.

Ellis ran forward and helped Pax push. The portal was only three feet away and right in front of the warhead, but even on wheels the bomb was hard to move. The thing felt like it weighed the same as a Volkswagen, and the portway gave little traction. Ellis’s feet were slipping and sliding. Then the case began to move, rolling slowly at first but then picking up speed.

“Don’t follow it through,” Pax warned, grabbing him. “Let it roll.”

The bomb continued to coast without their help, but when it reached the portal, it slammed to a stop.

“Storm it all!” Pax shouted.

It was obvious what had happened. The opening Pax made was an inch too high, and the wheels caught the lip. Objects needed to fully pass into a portal. Another safety feature, Ellis guessed, to stop people or things from being sheared off. Unless they could lift it and heave it through, the portal would need to be lowered.

Ellis looked at his watch: 00:2:38.

Pax pulled out the Port-a-Call again, and a second later the light show ended as the portal to space disappeared.

Ellis glanced down at Warren. There was a hole in the back of the suit. A much bigger one. Blood bubbled up like a tiny artesian well and drained down his sides onto the floor of the portway, where it made a growing puddle, spilling out bright red that was being illuminated from below by the lava. Warren wasn’t moving—wasn’t breathing.

“Stupid, stupid!” Pax was shouting even while manipulating the tiny control. Another portal appeared, this one at the same level, but a foot to the left. “Wrong bleezing coords, Pax!”

“Two-minute warning,” Ellis said.

The portal winked out.

Pax glared at the Port-a-Call with a fierce intensity that reminded Ellis of Isley playing with his Game Boy. Epic boss mob, Dad!he had shouted when Ellis had told him to empty the kitchen’s garbage. I’m down to my last life!

Another portal appeared, kicking out a new lightning-storm light show that caused it to flicker. This portal dipped down below the surface of the tunnel about a foot, and at the intersection the two wormholes fought each other. The whole portway flickered briefly, threatening to cut out.

Don’t worry. We haven’t had a tunnel failure yet. Everything down at this level runs off the Big D, and nothing’s going to interrupt her.Ellis hoped Geo-12 was right.

The new portal was also three feet back. Pax wisely realized they would need a runway to get the bomb rolling again.

Without a word, the two began pushing, only to find that Warren’s blood had spread out across the floor of the tunnel and partly around the bomb. It was like trying to push a car on ice.

Ellis pulled off his sweater and threw it on the ground, giving them something to get traction on.

00:01:31.

Leaning in, they threw their weight into it. Ellis was feeling the sweater about to give, when the bomb began to roll. The whole case inched forward at a snail’s pace, and once it was beyond the sweater, they couldn’t help it anymore, even though Pax continued to try until slipping and falling in the thin sheen of blood.

00:01:15.

Ellis raised his wrist so he could watch the clock and the warhead at the same time. The bomb inched forward at an agonizingly slow pace.

“One minute,” Ellis called just as the bomb reached the portal and then—

Pop!

The sparking hit a high note, and Pax’s portal lost its battle with the portway and vanished.

“No!” they both cried as the bomb rolled a few more feet and then stopped.

Pax took up the Port-a-Call again. “It’s not working! It’s not working!” That last word came out as a scream.

“Warren’s—get Warren’s!”

Together they rolled Warren over.

He’s dead. The thought was there knocking to get in, but Ellis didn’t have the time. He found the little device with its touch-sensitive screen, but the whole thing was covered in blood.

“I can’t get it to work,” Pax cried, wiping the screen on the thigh of the Amish pants. “It’s not the blood—it just won’t work! It’s broken like the other one.”

Ellis looked at his watch. 00:00:34.

He stepped forward, reached out, and took Pax in his arms. “My God, how I wish you were a woman.”

Pax settled against his chest and squeezed. “What difference does it make? I’m me.”

“Yes, you are.” He’d spent almost thirty-five years married to Peggy, but he’d never felt this close to her—to anyone. What happens if your soul mate is in the wrong body?

He felt Pax smile.

“And you’re telepathic.”

“Uh-huh.” Ellis felt Pax’s head rub up and down against him. “I hear the thoughts of those near me—feel their emotions as if they’re mine.”

00:00:20.

“Why couldn’t you tell me?”

“I couldn’t tell anyone. If anyone had known—if the ISP had discovered—they could have used me to make the Hive Project a reality. I like my bowler hat. I didn’t want everyone’s uniqueness taken away—I couldn’t stand for it to all be my fault.”

“That’s why you tried to kill yourself. To deny them the secret.”

Again he felt Pax nod.

00:00:10.

“I wanted to explain, but I was afraid people would reject me, hate me. Still I knew if anyone would be able to understand, be able to forgive me—it would be you.”

“Even though you know what I did to my son, Isley?”

“Yes.”

“He told me he was in love.” Ellis felt tears fill his eyes. “Only it was with another man. I told him he had to get over it. That what he was feeling wasn’t love. It couldn’t be, because love like that was only between men and women. I told him he had to choose between his family and this queer of his, because my sonwasn’t gay.”

“I know,” Pax said. Ellis looked down and saw that Pax was crying too. “And I know, afterward, you would have done anything to take it back.”

“I don’t even know why I said it.” Ellis was sobbing. They both were, as they stood hugging each other over the dead body of Warren Eckard in the molten Sea of Gehenna and waiting for…

Pax was the first to say it. “Shouldn’t we be dead by now?”

Ellis wiped his eyes and looked at his watch.

It blinked 00:00:00.

“The timer.” Ellis looked at the bomb sitting in its little chariot, a black silhouette against the blast furnace. “Warren said they were having trouble with the timer.”

Pax looked at the bomb too. “Does that mean it won’t go off at all, or do we just have more time?”

“Does it matter?” Ellis took the Port-a-Call from Pax and began scrubbing it with his shirttail. “Spit on your hands, wash them clean.”

“It won’t work. I told you, it’s not the blood.”

When Ellis had cleaned the device, he carefully handed it back. “Try it again anyway.”

Pax struggled. “No. It still won’t work. It’s frozen. I think the interaction with the other tunnel broke both of—oh, wait.” Pax looked puzzled. “The lock is on this one. No one puts the lock on.” Pax slid a finger across the surface of the device. “There.”

Another portal appeared. The warhead was out of the blood pool, and the two shoved again until the bomb was rolling forward at a good pace. They watched as if it were a caisson carrying a casket.

“Go! Go! Go!” they both began to yell as it neared the opening to space.

They watched it pass through the field and continue drifting at the same snail’s pace, but now through a field of stars. With a popping crack!the portal, just like its predecessor, collapsed.

Ellis looked over at Pax. “We’re alive.”