Divided Worlds Trilogy 01 - Disconnect (12 page)

Marcus looked at the levers. “These IOTians don’t know what hard labour really means. Stay here.” He jogged into a crowd and was soon masked from sight.

Zachary hesitated. What could he do to help?

Diego patted him. “The technician’s struggling. Inside the chamber.”

A window on the side of the metallic chamber showed a tall man racing back and forth around a central hub. He rammed down buttons that kept popping up.

“The field’s controls are failing,” added Diego. “We can help him.”

“How do you know?” Even if the recruit was right, were they allowed inside? Was the technician alone for a reason? “We might make it worse.”

“Or we can do something to stop it going wrong.” Diego raced to the chamber.

A small entrance separated the initial doorway from the main room of the chamber. Diego made a swift glance backward as he moved into the main room then rammed his palm against a button on the nearby wall before Zachary reached him. Panels slammed down in front of and behind Zachary, trapping him in the lobby.

Zachary smacked the porthole window on the panel to the main room. “Diego! What are you doing?”

Not answering, the recruit bounded over the hub to grapple the astounded technician. After a twist of the neck, the technician slipped onto the floor. Diego stood still for a few seconds before removing a slim Intercom from the pocket of his flared trousers. Since when did he have an Intercom?

“Snake Seven, reporting in. I’m at the force field’s hub,” said the recruit.

“Who is this?” fizzed a voice from his Intercom

Diego scraped his forehead. “Snake Seven.”

“I have no record of you –”

“Authorisation code 8-0-A-7.”

Spit from Zachary’s scathing growl smeared over the porthole. Diego was one of them? The liar. The cheat.

“Hmm. They sure kept you lot secret. Did you say that you were with the force field generator?” responded the Intercom.

“Yes – the hub. I’ll knock it off, but you have to confirm my request first.”

Goose bumps tingled on Zachary’s neck. “
Open the door!
”

“Your request will be authorised. I will see to it myself that your sister receives her rehab. Now, Snake Seven, knock off the force field.”

Zachary punched the panel, angered that he hadn’t seen this before. This was the reason for Diego’s displeasure the day he stepped into the Wastelands: he wasn’t from District Four at all.

“Diego. Stop this,” cried Zachary.

The recruit arose. “You want to know the real reason for why I’m here? It’s because of my sister. She needs treatment. She’s sick. I tried everything I could, but nothing worked. Nobody wanted to help me.” He thumped his chest. “I’m part of the District Infiltrators.”

The words rebounded within Zachary. “You knew this would happen. You let me believe the paper drop was a trick.”

“I never made you think anything. It was your choice.”

“You never stopped me. You betrayed me. People have been slaughtered. I ran through streets filled with blood.”

“My sister needs help.” Diego’s fingers shifted over the hub. All of the three warning buttons had popped up. A red beacon flashed on the ceiling. “They told me you were nothings that needed moving. I hoped they’d find another way.”

“
Scavengers hunt alone
,” spat Zachary. “I broke my rules for you.”

Diego pointed at the hub. “When I turn these off, the army will come in full force. This chamber’s made from rhenium diboride. It’s the toughest metal you can find. This will be the only thing left standing. You will survive. We both will.”

Zachary’s stomach turned inside out. “What about my dad?”

Several men charged at the window of the main room. They’d noticed the alarm. Zachary twisted to face the bangs coming from the first door of the chamber.

“Zach!” Marcus thumped the door. “Let me in!”

“I can’t. He’s going to turn off the force field.” Zachary sprung to the second door. “You do this, and I’ll never forgive you.”

Diego scowled as he turned a glowing dial on the hub. “You don’t understand what’s at stake.”

“Unauthorised deactivation of Energy Barrier has been detected. State authorisation code,” spoke a mechanical voice in the main room.

The recruit squirmed. “What code?”

“Incorrect. State authorisation code.”

“A word or a number?”

“Incorrect. State authorisation code.”

Hands flung over his face, Diego whined, “They never said there was a code.”

“Incorrect attempts exceeded. Target acquired.”

Darts harpooned from the upper corners of the room giving Diego no chance to dodge them. Fingers reacting to reach the gush of blood from his neck stopped midway. The recruit dropped dead.

The room’s voice spoke, “Energy Barriers shutdown.”

Zachary backtracked to the first door. “It’s going to come down.” The sound of machinery powering down filled the chamber. “Dad, there’s loads of them out there. You won’t stand a chance.”

Yellow light reflected upon his dad’s dilated eyes. Screams came and went from IOTians running amok. Explosions. Whirring noises. Something whistled overhead. Then, the dreaded bullets.

“Dad, get out of here.”

Marcus thumped the door with his shoulder. “I’m not leaving you.”

Zachary’s heart plummeted. “Hide! I need you!”

Sadness filled his dad’s face. “No – it was me who needed you.”

The chamber rocked. The second door whooshed upward behind Zachary. Marcus’s bloodied hand slapped the porthole. Like a hungry predator, a Rock-Walker emerged from black smoke filling the area. Bullets sprayed from his revolving arms onto the chamber.

DAD!

Cowering, eyes locked on the door, Zachary held his face. No – it can’t have ended this way. His dad would’ve evaded it; he had to have. The chamber rocked again. He crawled backward, wondering why the firing hadn’t stopped. His dad hadn’t been brandishing a weapon, but what did the soldiers care? They’d massacred innocent people in the streets and had now taken the most important man he’d never understood as well as he should have. Zachary eyed Diego’s corpse. How could his scavenging partner have deceived him?

“Look at what you’ve done! You helped them kill my dad. That was my dad. You could have made him come with me. You could have trapped us both.
But you didn’t
.”

Zachary raised his elbow, ready to bludgeon the recruit. Was that remorse he saw in Diego’s empty face?

“You shouldn’t have done this,” he whispered. “We were friends.”

Two blue glowing lights motioned outside the first door’s porthole. “We’ve got the area covered. It’s safe to come out.”

Zachary sat, startled, unsure of how to respond.

“Come on – open up,” said the soldier.

Zachary shook his way to the wall-mounted button that Diego had used earlier. Upon pressing it the first door unbolted upward. Fire raged deep into IOTA beyond the two soldiers entering full of confidence with their wide-legged swaggers. Nowhere behind could he see his dad.

An aged man, without a helmet, in thinner body armour followed. He slid fingers along a palm-shaped device. “Identify yourself.”

Zachary eyed the dead recruit. Were the Snakes such a secret that nobody knew their identity? In times when a threat was real, survival became the single option.

He straightened himself. “Diego Reyes. Snake Seven. Code 8-0-A-7.”

The aged man smiled. “Congratulations, Seven. You’re a hero.”

Zachary didn’t flinch from the old man’s scrutiny.

“I heard of them starving the corporals, but they certainly went to work on you.” The old man pushed a button on his padded collar. “Commander Paver here. District One’s been taken. Minimal inhabitant survivors. Low casualty count to the units.”

Zachary bit his lower lip to hide the scowl begging to be released. Was this the man that Diego had spoken to earlier about his sister?

Paver paused. “Absolutely, I agree, sir. He’s here now. As you wish. The General credits the valuable Intel you provided. Panthers, escort Snake Seven to Rendezvous Point Three.”

Zachary’s heels pressed down, trying to counter the shaking in his legs. So far, the army had fallen for the trick, though it couldn’t last long with all of the devices that they possessed. Wrong build. Wrong voice. Wrong face. Add to that, the dangerous sounding nature of Rendezvous Point Three.

Dread swamped Zachary’s thoughts as he followed the Panthers out of the main room. Why couldn’t the lobby have been longer; any delay to what was coming next would be a blessing. Empty, charred boots lay on the smoking ground. Tongue clenched between teeth, he stepped out. It couldn’t have been worse. Black crust covered a man with his tortured front upwards and fingers distorted beyond curled arms resting on his chest. Gut wrenching emotion swayed Zachary sideways. Knees thumping the ground, his hand caught the corpse’s brittle vest.

The nearest Panther kneeled. “Are you okay?”

Marcus’s chest hadn’t lost its warmness. Was that from the blast or did his heart contain faint hope?

Zachary sucked back the onslaught of heavy air building below his cheeks. “He helped me to get into District One. He shouldn’t have died. He never did anything wrong.”

“Is there a problem?” asked Paver from behind.

“No, sir,” replied the Panther, bolting up.

Paver passed them. “I hope your time in the gutters hasn’t established feelings towards the cockroaches? Letting them live would’ve given them a warrant to breed.”

The relationship that Zachary believed to exist with Overworld disintegrated. With no opportunity to negotiate as had been stated, Underworld had fallen to the sick plans of their rulers. It was true; Underworld defined waste in
Galilei
.

Terrified fingers hovered over Marcus’s face. Zachary wanted to be sure that his dad’s eyelids were shut, but the crust above them appeared thick. “What will you do to their bodies?”

“We incinerate them for fuel, or we eject them into space. Fuel appeals more.”

Of all the injustice, that comment pulled Zachary’s eyes in, ready to unleash anger boiling though his fingers and aching muscles. If only the Panthers weren’t present, he’d have snapped Paver’s wrinkled neck. How dare they burn the bodies?

Zachary glanced to his left, seeing the rear thrusters of the
Muirne
lying like shreds of a home demolished. In Underworld, the dead weren’t buried. Some were discarded in the black lakes, and others pushed to the depths of the cracks in the ground that nobody delved into. Were the Overworlders worse?

A Panther lifted Zachary. “I don’t want to be here when the incinerating starts.”

After a final look at his dad, Zachary began to walk alongside the soldiers. Mounds of dead bodies smoked next to the gate, battered off its hinges. Corrugated sheets of steel, ripped apart as if made of cloth, littered the area.

The Panther’s speedy pace took them east along the beginning of the residential section of District Two. Zachary spotted a single tower standing in Shantytown. He couldn’t take anymore. Eyes closed, nose sniffling, he counted the short seconds between each explosion.

Beyond the dipping banks another crack in the Far-Wall was present.

“I bet you’ll be glad to be back in your own slacks,” wheezed the first Panther.

Zachary scraped skin off his lips. “I can’t wait.”

“And I can’t wait to hear what tales you and the other Snakes have to tell.”

Unease fluttered in Zachary’s stomach. Great – there were other Snakes.

“Snake Three’s already checked in at the R-point,” continued the first Panther. “Two more signalled their positions in D1, but they were dead by the time we reached them. Seems they weren’t good at staying hidden. How long have you trained for this?”

“For a while.”

“You thin soldiers actually came to some use. It makes sense why you were chosen. In fact, do we even know each other?”

There were no numbers or symbols on the uniforms to distinguish between the Panthers. “I don’t know?”

The soldier’s flat mouthpiece detached downward like a ramp while the upper section separated into three panels. The head of a blond-haired soldier, not much older than Diego, emerged and smiled. Were all of the soldiers so young?

Zachary returned a blank stare.

The helmet closed returning the wheezed voice. “Ah well, at least you know me now. Believe me, when the General is done with you, you’ll be on every device by nightfall. How many of you were there?”

Paired soldiers gave Zachary a clue. “Eight, two per District.”

“Didn’t one in D3 call in as Snake Ten?” mumbled the second Panther.

Baring uneven teeth, Zachary scowled. “I don’t know the exact number. They didn’t tell me everything. We were meant to be a secret, remember.”

“Fair enough,” shrugged the first Panther. “Right, we’re here. I suggest you stay close and don’t go wandering off. I don’t want to have to explain to the General why you took a bullet to the head.”

At least a hundred blue eyes displayed between trucks that chugged along inside the wall’s space. Men in armoured trousers and grey vests aimed telescopes toward District Two. Messages about measurements and damage details were broadcast across the hum of large screens glittering above hubs.

Metal grated against metal on the northern side of the inner wall where a lift ascended, carrying grey-suited people.

“First things first. The Disinfector. Hold on when it starts, or you’ll be knocked back to the sewers,” said the first Panther pointing to a circular ring of high panels with a wide doorway in the centre.

Water sprayed out of nozzles along the enclosure’s inner surface onto standing soldiers. When the water stopped, the soldiers shook then left with wisps of steam floating off them.

“Go on, Three’s just coming out,” said the first Panther. “Best place for a reunion, wouldn’t you say?”

A short man wrapped a large towel over himself. Zachary couldn’t let Snake Three’s sight fall on him; a single accusation and he’d be primed for target practice. He jogged past Snake Three without stopping to exchange words, not that the infiltrator appeared bothered to participate.