The Future War

***

John felt the double vision vanish as he saw Ninel fall limp.

Again, he thought. Wendy, now her. Again.

The scream that bubbled out of his lips wasn't a giant no: that was in there, but most of it was raw rage and inconsolable grief, grief for an entire lifetime past and the one he saw stretching out ahead of him.

The knife tucked into his boot had a seven-inch blade; nothing fancy, just a sharp tapering steel wedge. His hand moved in a blurring arc; the woman who'd shot Ninel seemed to be turning in slow motion—unable to move more than a quarter of the way around before the blade bisected her kidney with a violence that punched the inside of his fist against the cloth of her jacket as it rammed home.

He moved with her, like a dancer—his left hand grasping her gun hand, turning her in a pirouette and throwing her forward at her companion. That one's eyes and mouth gaped in Os of surprise as he caught at the sprattling weight; the same motion pulled John's blade free. He flipped it to a reverse grip and punched it forward over the dying woman's shoulder, right into her friend's eye. Faster than the flicker of a frog's striking tongue, deep enough that the narrow shoulders at the hilt of the blade stuck on the bone of the socket.

'You're terminated, fucker,' John wheezed, then ignored the falling mass. Neither of them were going to bother anyone, ever again.

Kneeling beside Ninel, he slowly reached toward her neck with two bloodstained fingers. No pulse. He hadn't expected there would be. He wiped his hand on his pants so he wouldn't stain her face and closed her eyes so that the whites no longer showed.

Then John took her in his arms—something in him sickening at the limpness of her body—and lifted her as he stood. He pushed his grief aside, putting himself outside the emotion.

Guess I'm not meant to have relationships, he thought. He opened the door and took her down to where the other casualties lay. This one they'd be leaving behind.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

USS ROOSEVELT

So you traveled all the way from Alaska to Argentina on your own?' Captain Chu asked.

Sarah took a sip of her coffee, looking at him over the rim.

He'd invited her to dinner in the officers' mess in a not very subtle attempt to interrogate her. She didn't mind; if she'd been in his position, the interrogation would have taken place on that Argentine beach, not en route to Alaska.

'Yep,' she said after a very long sip. 'I have a Harley that we adapted to run on alcohol. It's not all that clean, but you get decent mileage.'

'What's it like?' he asked.

'Meaning the world outside the Roosevelt?' she asked. He nodded.

A totally honest question, Sarah thought. Deserves an honest answer. 'It's hell,' she said. 'I can't overstate that. Death everywhere—from the bombs, from disease, from marauders, starvation.'

There'd been an old-folks home that would haunt her to her dying day.

'That bad?' he asked, flinching almost imperceptibly at the expression on her face.

'Worse. Rape, murder, you name it. Most people were completely unprepared to take care of themselves and there's always someone to take advantage of that. It's the ugliest thing you can imagine out there. And I didn't even go near the cities.'

He closed his mouth and sat back, looking a bit pale. 'How did you manage? I mean, a woman alone.'

He didn't mean it as a put-down, she could tell. Sarah smiled, a curve of her lips that didn't reach her eyes, and he blinked. 'I am prepared,' she said. 'I've been prepared for a long time. Most people, even the lowest, have some sense of self-preservation, and they can see that. Those that don't are better off dead.'

'Ah-huh…' He looked at her for a moment, and she met his eyes. Then he nodded and went back to his dinner.

Sarah raised a brow. 'No further questions?'

'Not at this time.' He dabbed his lips with his napkin, then set it aside. 'When we reach our destination I'll undoubtedly have more. But for now there's no point. We do indeed owe you a debt, both for getting us out of that harbor and for the food.' He tipped his head. 'And so, providing you with transport to Alaska might be considered fair barter. It doesn't mean we're throwing in with you.'

She smiled, this time sincerely. 'Understood.' She knew they'd join the resistance. There was no other choice, really. And these were the kind of men who wanted to make a difference; they were a good match. Her smile turned to a grin. 'You'll like my son.'

TATILEK, ALASKA

Tatilek sprawled in weathered wooden buildings along one side of a narrow fiord, fir-clad mountains rising blue around it until they topped out in ragged snowpeaks. On the rare sunny days, those colors matched the waters; more commonly the sky was gray above, and gray green topped with foam, as it was today. The town was pretty much closed to outsiders unless they could somehow verify that they had legitimate business there.

Apparently Vera's brief stay had been memorable because at the mention of Love's Thrust, her yacht, eyes rolled, grins appeared, and hands were thrust out in welcome.

John and Ike sat on the pier eating smoked salmon and sipping some very bad home-brewed beer.

'Jee-zus Christ,' Ike said, looking into the bottle. 'What the hell did they make this with? Yak piss?'

'More likely moose,' John said. 'Not many yaks in Alaska.'

He took a sip and looked at the bottle with a grimace. 'Or maybe grizzly.'

'It does have a bite,' Ike said with a chuckle, and glanced nervously at the younger man. Since the raid on the automated factory there'd been something different about him. It was hard to pin down. But sometimes, even times like now when they were just sitting and eating, he felt almost like he was talking to a stranger.

He's preoccupied, Ike told himself, as he had a dozen times before. But deep down he found himself thinking: He's getting to be like his mother.

Not a good thing; Sarah sure as hell hadn't handled it all that well. At least not at first. Of course Dieter had a lot to do with centering her; if ever there was a solid man it was the big Austrian. Ike chewed thoughtfully.

Maybe it's for the best. If John was going to be the leader of the resistance, he was going to need some distance from the people around him. People he might have to knowingly send to their deaths. The old man's jaws froze. People like his father. He turned to study his young friend. Christ, what a world they were living in.

John sat up straighter and put his bottle of beer aside. 'Yup, here they are,' he said.

Out in the bay the water slid back from something huge and black, then curled into foam as the hull broke free. Then the rest of the submarine surged to the surface, water sloughing off its blunt sides. Ike grinned.

'It's huge!' he said, and laughed.

'Sixteen thousand tons,' John said. 'Eighteen thousand submerged; crew of a hundred and forty, and a hundred SEALs.'

He winked. 'Think it'll do?'

'You betcha, kid. We're in business!'

'My mom always did get me the coolest toys,' John said with a satisfied smile.

* * *

'You're the first military we've seen here in months,' the mayor said to Chu. 'The army and National Guard came by a coupla weeks after Judgment Day, but that was it.'