Without warning

He lay awake in his cot most nights, unable to sleep properly, tortured by the loss of his family. It was wrong, he knew, to feel their deaths so much more keenly than the hundreds of millions of lives snuffed out on that day and since. But that was just how people were. As each day went past, he found it more difficult to deal with their absence, not less. He often caught himself thinking irrationally of calling one of his boys or his wife. And then he’d remember… and his mood would implode.

‘Well, let the Cubans escort me, General,’ continued Griffiths, who was entirely oblivious to the needs of anyone but himself. ‘They don’t have to follow your orders, do they? I’m sure some of them would love a chance to travel back into their own country.’

Musso spun on him. ‘Go ask them yourself, Professor, but first, tell me what the fuck have you actually learned while you’ve been here? Tell me what anyone has learned, here or anywhere else, about that thing.’

Griffiths staggered back one step and opened his mouth, but no words came out, because there was nothing to say. The Wave did not exist, at least not according to any instruments or sensor arrays currently available. The only evidence that it still sat there, squatting over the North American continent, was available by looking north. There it soared, miles into the sky. Mute, terrible and utterly impenetrable.

‘Nobody is stopping you, Professor. Off you go, if you wish. But do not bother my people about it. I have lost half-a-dozen of them to that thing, not to mention the Cubans it’s grabbed up. It’s random. There is no safe distance within two thousand metres of it. People have been snatched from twenty feet away, and two klicks. You were told all of this, on arrival. Nothing has changed.’

Griffiths, a small man afflicted with receding red hair, appeared likely to blow a gasket. But unlike Musso he still had control of his temper. ‘I am sorry for the loss of your men, General…’

‘And women. Two of my Marines were women – Corporal Crist and Lieutenant Kwan.’

‘Okay. I am sorry. But those casualties all predated my arrival. I do not need anyone to follow me into the exclusion zone. Entering is a risk I am willing to take. But I cannot get out there without an escort. There are simply too many bandits now. It is too dangerous.’

Musso made another conscious effort not to explode. He tried to climb down from the heights of his rage. Perhaps Griffiths was right. Nobody had ever been taken beyond two thousand metres. The survey stations in the Pacific Northwest and Canada confirmed that too. If the scientist had the nuts to take himself inside that safe, established perimeter on his own, who was he to argue? After all, if the Wave gobbled him up, it’d be one less headache for Musso to deal with.

‘Okay,’ the general replied, ‘you can have an escort to within three thousand metres. After that, you’re on your own. Even if you get nailed by bandits within clear sight of my people, if you are in the zone, you’re on your own. See if you can remember that little rhyme. It’ll help with your confusion when we don’t come running to drag your ass out of trouble.’

Stavros stepped forward at that point. ‘General, your meeting with the French consul, sir. You’re going to be late.’

‘Thanks, George,’ he grunted. It wasn’t even a set-up. He really did have a meeting, for which he was truly grateful. ‘Dr Griffiths, if you don’t mind, I have to sign off on the last of the refugee convoys today. Perhaps when they are gone, there will be time for dealing with your issues.’

That seemed to surprise and even mollify the scientist somewhat, and Musso climbed into the Humvee without delay. He didn’t offer the civilians a ride anywhere.

* * * *

‘These won’t be the last refugees we get, you know, General.’

‘I know, Susie, but it will be the last big convoy the navy escorts anywhere. The word from Pearl is finito. It’s been a month. From now on, people will have to make their own arrangements. We’re losing more of our power-projection capability with each passing day.’

The midnight hour had long since passed and Musso was back in his office, enjoying the chill of the air- conditioning and the absence of pests. He nursed a precious cup of coffee. At least in this part of the world, it was still plentiful, if hard to get. Colonel Pileggi sat across from him, just outside the cone of light thrown down by his desk lamp, half hidden in the gloom, with an old-fashioned clipboard on her knee as she ticked off items on her checklist. Behind her, the waters of the bay twinkled under a bright moon and dozens of civilian craft of all sizes lay quietly at anchor, awaiting the departure of the final convoy for the Pacific.

A few small lighters still plied a path between them, distributing stores, collecting passenger lists, and handing out information on convoy protocols. In contrast with the first few crazed days of his time at Gitmo, a skeleton crew was on deck at the headquarters building. The base slumbered out in the darkness.

‘So we can expect the escorts here tomorrow?’ she asked doubtfully. There had been problems recently transiting the Canal. With the Panamanian Government’s collapse, Pearl had finally put in a Brigade Combat Team to control the locks, but they were being pressed by an unknown number of criminal syndicates. Not a day went by without one or two casualties among the Americans. On the upside, though, the rules of engagement for the Canal Zone were robust. Anybody approaching the American-controlled locks was immediately engaged and destroyed without warning.

Musso nodded. ‘It should be cool. Principal escort’s French, coming up from Guyana. It’s an F-70-class frigate, although it’s big enough that we’d call it a destroyer. I spoke with their guy when he flew in late this afternoon from Cayenne. It won’t have to transit the Canal until the convoy gets there and it has enough firepower to muscle through any parts we can’t provide cover for. And a solid detachment of Marine infantry, for good measure. Our guys will pick them up on the other side. Then the French will split off with a smaller group for New Caledonia.’

Pileggi raised one eyebrow but remained silent.

Musso picked up on her reaction and shrugged to show his own. ‘I know, I know. Surprised me too. I thought the French were too busy tearing each other apart to bother with helping anyone else, but Sarkozy’s faction has been looking real hard at their Pacific territories. You want my opinion, there’s going to be a lot of Frenchies opting out of food riots and ethnic cleansing for grass skirts and Gilligan’s Island any day now.’

‘Damn,’ muttered Pileggi. ‘Is that the good dope you’re smoking? Straight from Pearl?’

‘Yeah,’ said Musso. ‘There have been talks, apparently. Very quiet talks. This consular guy confirmed as much. We may be in business as a transit point in the future – assuming Sarkozy wins, of course.’

‘That’s quite an assumption from what I’ve read, General.’ A new worry now etched itself into the deep lines of Pileggi’s face, shadows pooled under her eyes. ‘I’ve got a lot of my refugees bunking down in the French colonies.