Critical Dawn (17 page)

Charlie pulled back the camouflaged tarp, revealing a rusted Ford F-150. The oncered paintwork had given way to a colonization of orange rust. Among the conquering march of time and decay, small islands of defiant paint remained.

Leaves and twigs covered the hood, clinging to the surface.

Charlie swept them off and cleared the debris from the cracked windshield.

The noon sun streaked through the surrounding trees and gleamed off the glass, the cracks refracting a rainbow of light in thin slivers.

A solid metal lockbox took up a quarter of the rear bed. It contained a few days’ supplies, water, ammo, a pair of shotguns, and an old Army tent.

Pip jumped up into the extended cab as soon as Denver opened the passenger door, curling up on an old grey blanket between the two front seats.

Ethan stood by the river’s edge with his mouth open as he stared on. They’d hidden the truck in a tight copse of trees and shrubs the week before as they scouted the harvester’s route.

Charlie waved him and Maria forward from their temporary camp.

“Does it run?” Ethan said, running his hand along the fender as though it were an ancient relic. To Ethan, it probably is, Charlie thought. He’d have only seen them on whatever brainwashing videos the aliens had given to them to watch.

“Yeah,” Charlie said. “Of course it runs.”

“How did you keep it working all through the invasion and the ice age?” Maria asked as she joined them.

“My old Army friend was a mechanical genius,” Charlie said. “Between him and a colleague of mine, we sourced spare parts and kept it running. With so many people dead and so many vehicles abandoned, it’s not difficult to source fuel and parts. Back in New York, there’s a number of Ford dealers and warehouses that we got replacement parts from.”

“So where are we going?” Maria said as Denver loaded up more supplies and the weapons taken from the croatoans.

“Going to take a trip to the East Coast. The Big Apple. Come on, get in; we need to set off if we’re to get there in good time. It’s going to be a long journey. The roads aren’t exactly easy these days,” Charlie said. He held the rear passenger door open and waited for Ethan and Maria to settle in.

Denver jumped into the front passenger seat.

Once inside, Charlie turned the key, and after a few splutters, the old diesel power plant roared to life, belching out a little black smoke before purring like a wild cat. He put it into drive and slowly pulled away from the hiding place, keeping the wheels on the harder parts of the forest floor.

From their shelter in Mohan Run, a small clearing within the forest, Charlie drove the truck out through the trees, only once scraping against a branch, and joined the hard surface of Interstate 219. The plan was to head south to I-80, which would take them all the way into New York.

Fragments of blacktop had long peeled off the road. Multiple croatoan-engineered environmental changes, especially the ice, had conspired to ruin the surface. But as long as he stayed vigilant, they could make good time.

“I would have expected more cars and trucks,” Ethan said, leaning forward from the rear.

“That’s the kind of thing you see in the films,” Denver said.

“He’s right,” Charlie added, steering around a ten-foot-wide pothole and accelerating onto a clear patch. “When the invasion happened, it took many by surprise, but the war waged for a number of years. Plenty of time for people to get off the roads and go somewhere safe. You’ll see most of the cars still parked near people’s homes or service stations and car lots. The roads were deserted during the war to allow military traffic to get into position without worrying about the public.”

“Where are all the bodies?” Ethan asked. “I’d have expected to see more.”

Charlie looked at the young man through the rearview mirror. He didn’t really know what he was asking. The idea that billions of people were butchered had to be entirely alien to him. There just wasn’t a way for someone like him, so detached from his own species, to fully comprehend what had happened.

But he’d soon get the idea.

“Most were buried,” Charlie eventually said as he found a clear patch of road. Even without the blacktop in place, the hard concrete provided a brief section of smooth ride. “Despite the situation, many families, neighborhoods, and government organizations did their best to give everyone a proper burial, but sometimes, that wasn’t always possible.”

“So what happened then?”

Charlie wanted to tell Ethan to drop it, to focus on survival rather than the dead, but as painful as it was to bring back those memories, it could just be what he and Maria needed to bring some perspective.

“I’ll show you,” Charlie said. “For now, try and get some rest. We’ll be travelling for at least nine, maybe ten hours. If we’re lucky.”

He thought about the croatoans. They wouldn’t be happy with the previous day’s losses. That was as many of the aliens as Charlie and Denver had killed since the war. Up until now, he and Denver were probably just a minor thorn in their sides, but now … If he were on the other side, he wouldn’t take those losses without some form of vengeance.

Charlie stared out of the windshield and thought that it didn’t look too bad. The trees, bushes, and vines that had built up beside the road and some that had sent roots through the concrete and gravel broke it up into large fragments. It looked quite beautiful.

But the cost of attaining this natural beauty wasn’t worth the blood in the soil.

At one point, the branches that stretched across the road were so thick, they had to get out and chop their way through with machetes and blades Charlie had fashioned from the alien metal. An hour later and they were back on the road, finding clearer spots, making good ground.

When they approached towns or cities, Charlie always took the outer route, preferring to avoid going into the center where there were likely to be pockets of survivors. At one point, a distant sniper fired upon them, a warning shot, hissing over the hood.

“I don’t understand why they would fire on us,” Ethan said. “Surely with so few of us left, they’d leave us be.”

“They’re just frightened,” Denver said. “Not many with working vehicles. Probably think we’re scouting for the farms.”

Charlie noted the change in Ethan’s thinking by the use of
us
. Good, he thought. The kid is starting to think the right way. If his plans to take down the croatoans were to work, he’d need people like Ethan and Maria to see that humanity was not at war with each other for resources or survival. They had to be united in their struggles.

***

A further four hours passed without incident; they’d crossed into New Jersey and were only a few hours from their destination of Newark. Charlie drove the truck up a hill; the road had crumbled away to dirt and gravel, but the F-150’s 4-wheel drive dug in deep and pulled them up to the summit. Putting it into park and engaging the emergency brake, Charlie got out, leaving the engine running.

He opened the door and gestured for Ethan and Maria to get out. They looked at him suspiciously. “I just want to show you two something,” Charlie said, turning his back and approaching the edge of the hill.

Ethan and Maria joined him, and both took a sharp intake of breath.

Down in the green valley beyond, a two-hundred-foot-wide sinkhole scarred the earth like a huge wound. Around its crumbling edge, houses and other buildings were left in ruin. Half of their walls had collapsed long ago, their open sides providing shelter for shade-loving plants or trees.

But it wasn’t the ruined homes that caused the surprise; neither was it the huge CAT diggers rusting away on the perimeter. It was what was in the sinkhole that caused the reaction.

The very thing Ethan had expected to see.

Bodies.

Or more accurately—skeletons.

“When things got really bad, after the gas and the initial attack, it became impossible for the authorities, what were left, to handle so many bodies,” Charlie said. “Hospitals were overrun. Funeral homes and cemeteries were full to bursting. Families, those that survived the initial stage, buried their dead in their gardens or in makeshift graves in the woods or other common areas.

“But when the numbers got too huge, the remaining militia, in an effort to prevent the spread of disease, used the same sinkholes the croatoans created to come to the surface to bury the dead.

“All over the country, you’ll find huge ones like this with thousands and thousands of bodies in them.”

Charlie stared away into the distance. The evening sun silhouetted a dozen birds as they glided above the sinkhole. But there was no meat on the bones anymore. They were picked clean by scavengers and the elements years ago.

“That’s terrible,” Maria said, her voice barely a whisper. Ethan remained silent, taking in the scene, realizing what he was looking at.

Charlie didn’t want to have to show them this, but he needed them to understand what was at stake, what had happened to humanity. They had no sense of the numbers or what life was like before. But this would help bring the necessary perspective.

They all got back into the truck, silent, haunted by what they had seen. Charlie didn’t say anything, just let it sink in, let the enormity of what happened finally get through to them.

He turned around on the summit and headed back down the hill, rejoining I-80 and moving toward Newark Bridge. He gunned the engine, taking advantage of a rare section of clear road. He wanted to get to the bridge before sun up. They’d have to complete the rest of the journey throughout the night, swapping driving duties.

Over the sound of the engine, he heard a throaty roar streak by them overhead. An icy chill crept up his spine. The last time he’d heard a sound like that was when the croatoan fighter craft first descended upon the earth.

Layla huddled under her duvet with a flashlight, poring through personal notes from the last few years. She needed irrefutable evidence before going to Gregor with her findings. Something to join up the dots.

She cursed under her breath as she read her last two diaries. Self-indulgent, whiny, and lacking solid information. With the benefit of hindsight and clear focus, it felt like she was reading extracts from her college days. The Layla that thought the world was against her, living like a hermit in her student apartment, studying the very thing she purposely avoided.

Her notebooks weren’t much better. A lot of hurried scrawls about the livestock condition, available food, and observed human-human and human-croatoan interactions. Clouds surrounded the notes filled with written ideas about how to improve things. Nothing about the noticeable rise in humidity, increasingly amber skies, or the greasy film that was starting to coat the region’s foliage. She kicked herself for not paying attention to the bigger picture.

Layla checked her watch. Three in the morning. The only thing for it was a clandestine trip to the chocolate factory. She slid open a window next to her bed and listened.

Distant clanking came from the meat-processing warehouses. Nothing unusual; the automated machines ran around the clock. Layla had only been inside those buildings on a single occasion. That was enough. She’d narrowly avoided throwing up.

An owl hooted.

She gently rattled open the flimsy trailer door and crept past Gregor’s office. Light streamed through gaps in the blinds. She heard raised voices coming from inside. Probably talk of
the good old days
with Marek after a few drinks.

Layla glanced into the clear, navy, starred sky. The mother ship was more revealing during the hours of darkness. It must’ve been hundreds of miles away but still appeared large, vivid. A bright strip ran across its center.

Pouring in and out of the strip, minute specks of light headed to and from earth, shuttles on their supply runs. Hundreds of them like worker bees, probably landing at different farms around the world in other time zones.

The moon looked like a scarred apricot as it had for a while. She’d seen it that color before when on vacation in Sydney. A bushfire took hold in the Blue Mountains, smoke scattering the rays of light from Earth’s natural satellite.

Layla knew the croatoans were terraforming but avoided the inconvenient truth. The requests to update land conversion and the experiment on the paddock brought it into sharper focus. Survival instincts that motivated her to work on the farm were now pushing her in the opposite direction.

Monitors faintly glowed through the frosted glass of the chocolate factory door. Vlad was probably watching them at the far end of the building. Nothing in the immediate vicinity suggested the presence of surveyors.

The square was quiet. No signs of any outdoor alien activity.

She slowly twisted the handle, slipped through the gap, and closed the door behind her. Vlad slumped over the desk in front of the bank of monitors, probably getting a snatch of sleep. It wasn’t a huge issue to doze on shift. The harvester alerts sounded like the grating buzz of an old, electronic alarm clock.

Ambient light was sufficient enough for Layla not to use her flashlight. She crept around the empty surveyors’ table to a walled-off area on the left-hand side.

Croatoans usually carried their equipment and charts there before leaving. The space was used by the alien with the red-rimmed helmet visor. It usually sat surrounded by three of their little computers. Layla watched the alien enter the chocolate factory two weeks ago. The devices sprang to life when the croatoan touched them. She hoped it would be that simple. Just like their tablet devices.

All three trapezium-shaped computers were folded open. Layla took a deep breath and touched a central pad with a silver outline on the first.

The screen filled with bright electric-blue background. A black square in the middle streamed unrecognizable, light green digits. Layla swished her finger across the pad. Nothing happened.

She touched the middle computer. The screen burst into life and split into four sections, each showing a different graphic. The top right was a bizarre picture of planet Earth; the bottom three-quarters of the globe were orange-tinted. It spun around, showing hundreds of black dots across the continents, probably farms. In the top left was a graph, some kind of measurement, impossible to read.

The bottom two pictures showed North America. One she recognized as the land they’d farmed colored in red. It wasn’t a surprise that the croatoans were also tracking progress; she expected that. The final picture had a shaded-in area of previously untouched land to the north of their location. She guessed it covered a hundred square miles.

Layla focused on the last image and wondered if she was looking at the tipping point for the required atmospheric change. It looked too small.

She touched the last computer. It flashed awake.

The display looked like a timeline. Thirty tasks in alien language. Twenty-eight struck through. Whatever they were doing, it looked close to completion.

None of the information was as compelling as the experiment. Collectively, it all led to the same logical conclusion.

Something gripped Layla’s shoulder.

She flinched. Turned.

Igor smiled, his face bathed in a blue glow from the computers. “Fancy seeing you here.”

Layla put her hand to her chest and felt her rapidly drumming heart. She let out a deep breath. “Jesus. I thought you were …”

His right arm was behind his back. He never failed to look shifty and dangerous.

“Thought I was an alien?” Igor said. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” She glanced to his side. “What have you got there?”

Igor stepped toward her. “Things are going to change around here. You need to make sure your colors are nailed to the right mast.”

***

Gregor poured a whiskey into a shot glass, slammed it onto the table, and pushed it across to Ben. The dog from the harvester had earned it.

“Drink. It’ll put hairs on your chest,” Gregor said.

Ben frowned and twisted the glass. “What is it?”

“The water of life. Now drink. Do not insult me.”

Ben the dog held the contents of the glass in his cheeks and swallowed with a single, exaggerated gulp. He screwed up his face, squeezed his neck, and coughed.

Marek, who stood beside Ben, roared with laughter. “Looks like he enjoyed it.”

“You do realize what’s going to happen if I find out you’re lying?” Gregor said. He swiped a finger across his own throat.

“Why would I lie? It’s been a nightmare since he attacked our harvester.”

Gregor held up the necklace and gazed at the bead. “Jackson pretended to be my friend when I first arrived. It was all an act. He was gathering information for his assaults. He risks all our lives.”

Marek pointed at the dog. “What are we going to do with him?”

“I’m with you guys. You can trust me,” Ben said.

Gregor stared at the dog, mulling over three options. Ben quickly broke eye contact and looked down at his empty glass.

They couldn’t return him to the Operations Compartment of the repaired harvester. This dog had seen the outside world. He could easily open his mouth during a moment of weakness and compromise the whole crew. The second option was to turn him into silver trays of slop. It seemed like a waste.

“I’m going to reward you,” Gregor said. “Because of the information you provided, you can have a job on the farm. Be under no illusion; what I give I can take away with a bullet. Do you understand?”

It wasn’t much different from the speech Gregor used to give to new recruits in Yerevan. Before anyone became fully integrated, they had to prove themselves. Ben the dog had already done this to some extent, but Gregor was wary. Jackson had shown to be a sly operator in the past. Leopards didn’t change their spots.

Gregor smiled as the frightened dog nodded.

“Yes. Thank you, sir,” Ben said.

Gregor winced. “Don’t call me—”

Two knocks boomed against the door.

“Who the hell is that at this time?” Marek said.

Before anyone could respond, Layla flung the door open. She looked immediately at the dog.

“Strange time for a visit,” Gregor said.

“I’ve been carrying out a little bit of the investigation work you asked me to do. Who’s he?”

“Let me introduce you to Ben,” Gregor said. He held up the necklace. “He’s given me the location of a hideout used by the little wasp. Jackson tried to use him as his new bitch. Recognize this?”

“Is that?” Layla said.

“Jackson’s necklace. Yes. I’m going in a few hours.” He turned to Ben. “He’ll show me the way. And you’re coming with us.”

“Me?”

“If you’re bullshitting, I’ll leave you in the forest.”

Layla sat on the couch. “We’ve got bigger things to worry about.”

“Bigger things than Charlie Jackson?” Marek said. “We’ve wanted that bastard for years. What could be bigger?”

“Yesterday, I watched the croatoans carrying out a test. Did you see a large transparent structure in the paddocks?”

Gregor nodded. “We passed over it. Why?”

“It was some sort of atmosphere box. They tested five different levels on humans and aliens. Let’s just say we wouldn’t survive in an environment where they can take their helmets off.”

“It doesn’t take a genius to work that out. They wouldn’t wear them in the first place if they didn’t need them,” Marek said.

“You’re missing the point,” Layla said. “Look around you. The sky during dusk and dawn. Go out and look at the moon. The increase in land conversion. It’s all building.”

“They want more root. So what?” Gregor said.

“They’re terraforming the planet. The root is how they’re doing it.”

“Even a fool can see they’re changing the place. What are we supposed to do about it?” Gregor said.

“Why would we run away to live in a ruined city?” Marek said. “Somebody else would just step in. The croatoans needs us. We’ve proven that.”

“I’ve just come back from the chocolate factory. There was information on the computers that collectively pointed to something happening very soon.”

“Very soon? Collectively?” Gregor said.

“Graphics and a timeline,” Layla said. “They looked close to concluding whatever they are trying to achieve. I think the experiment backs it up.”

“I think you’re being a little dramatic,” Gregor said. “We provide them with food. Manage the farms around the world. Why would they choke us to death?”

Layla rolled her eyes. “I don’t know. To live on our planet in conducive conditions?”

“No need to get sarcastic. I can’t risk everyone’s lives based on your theory. You might be completely wrong.”

“And if I’m not?”

Ben cleared his throat.

“Do you have something to say?” Marek said.

“Charlie thinks the same,” Ben said. “That’s why he’s been trying to stop it.”

“Who gives a fuck what he thinks?” Gregor said. Ben looked back at his boots. “I can see things changing. We can all see things are changing. It’s a question of to what level, the timing, and our personal survival. Layla, I’m not going through this in the middle of the night.”

“We might not have time to wait,” Layla said. “I told you the other day they’re acting differently. It’s happening soon. I know it.”

Gregor twirled the necklace around on his finger. He sat back in his chair, stroking his chin. “First I deal with the hideout. Layla, try to find out more. We’ll get together this evening and decide our next steps. If we act, we have to be one hundred percent sure. I’m not risking everything on a hunch.”

She nodded.

“It’s crazy,” Marek said. “We’ve been doing this for ten years. Why now?”

“We’ll discuss it tonight. I need a couple of hours sleep before heading out,” Gregor said.

“There’s something else,” Layla said. “Igor came into the chocolate factory. I think he knows what’s going on. He threatened me and said things were changing.”

“Don’t worry about that Russian scumbag. I’ve got him just where I want him,” Gregor said.

“Have you?” Layla said. “Or does Augustus?”

“Screw that freak,” Gregor said, resisting the urge to insult Layla. He jumped from his chair and grabbed the back of Ben’s neck. “I’ve got my eye on a different prize at the moment.”