Читать книгу The Gravitational Leap - Darrell Lee - Страница 9

In the Denock encampment, fifty kilometers from the Tower, anxious men sat around a table. The sunrise would be in two hours. The wind screamed, hurled blowing snow sideways, and beat itself against the walls and ceiling of the long house tent. Inside, kerosene lanterns sat on tables and hung from the age-darkened tent poles. Sjund shared a meal with the eight elder members of the Denock clan. Across the table were the leaders of the Asus clan.

The Asus were from the far west, beyond the mountains and beyond the great desert on the other side of the mountains. They were muscular and tall; some of them had only deer and bison hide for clothing. Their skin gleamed oily and dark. They came east during the growing season to hunt wild game and collect berries. In recent years, the game had become scarce and the snow stayed on the ground longer, so they ventured farther east. They had known about the clan with the Tower behind the wall for generations, and they feared both the Tower and wall. Usually, they would make quick hit-and-run attacks, to steal cattle and horses from the villagers who lived outside the wall, then they would quickly return west for the winter. They had seen the floodlights during the night when they dared to approach too close. The soldiers feared it; surely the clan inside must possess magic and superior weapons.

Along the walls of the tent, well-armed soldiers from each clan stared at each other. The eldest leader of the Denock clan, Tristan, had long, salt and pepper hair and a full beard. His shoulders were broad and thick, not muscular but not fat. He sat next to Sjund, fifteen years younger than Tristan, thin but athletic. Sjund wore the same thing as the Denock elders, a brown leather parka and pants, each lined with bison fur.

“Your man is late,” Tristan said to his Asus counterpart, named Taavi.

The orange light of a lantern on the table reflected off Taavi’s white hair and beard. It cast shadows along the black creases in his face and reflected off his eyes, which were dingy yellow around the irises. “If the information provided is good, he will succeed,” Taavi replied. “Tomorrow night all the High Council members will be dead. We will begin our attack. By morning, if Sjund’s bomb works as you claim, and can make a hole as big as you say, we’ll be eating breakfast in the Tower.”

All the elders ate in silence. A radio, like the one the assassin took with him, sat in the middle of the table. They waited for the transmission that would inform them he had slipped inside the wall. Sjund had drawn a map of the location of a crevasse in the wall, just wide enough for a man to squeeze through and crawl his way inside. Once through the wall he would emerge in a small alleyway behind the horse stables. The stable house roof blocked the view into the alley from atop the wall. The assassin’s plan was to hide in the stable, in the rafters or an unoccupied stall, change into civilian clothes, conceal his dark face and hands, and wait until he received radio contact informing him that the initial assault platoons were in place and undetected. After nightfall he would kill the elders in the Tower and radio his commander that the leaders were dead, and the attack would begin. From the stables the Tower stood less than three hundred meters away, and the entry to the secret tunnel that led to it was one hundred meters away.

“Were you not impressed with the small demonstration we gave you?” Sjund asked.

“Blowing an old tree stump out of the ground is one thing—that wall is different,” Taavi said.

“The bomb I’m going to make will be many times greater in size than the one I showed you. If it doesn’t outright collapse the wall, it will blow a hole big enough for your men to enter five abreast. But your men must keep the forces along that section of the wall occupied long enough for me to make the bomb at the base of the wall,” Sjund said.

Taavi looked at Sjund warily. “What’s the name of this material you say possesses enough power to do this?”

“Nitroglycerin.”

“How did you learn to make such a weapon?”

“In the Tower, there’s a room—the historical room, with many books, very, very old books. I found it in one of them.”

“If it’s so powerful why doesn’t the clan behind the wall have it?” Taavi asked.

“The ingredients are difficult to produce and somewhat unstable. It fits our purpose nicely, but it’s not good for military use. The formula is so old, I doubt anybody knew it existed, and I have the only copy of the book that explains how it’s done.”

Taavi chewed on the piece of meat a bit longer. Then he spoke again.

“Since the rest of our soldiers have made it through the mountain pass from our home territory, and you have seen the new weapons—the machine guns—we have acquired, along with all the ammunition needed, and the new radios, we have demonstrated our commitment to this alliance.

“I have thought some more about our arrangement. If the bomb doesn’t work, we’ll have to retreat. My men will be the most at risk. I think we should be paid one head of cattle for every three soldiers killed, not four.”

“If we fail to breech the wall you’ll get your payment, as we agreed—” Tristan began.

“I have something I would like to show you,” Sjund said and placed his hand on Tristan’s shoulder. “If you and the other elders would follow me to the blacksmith’s tent?”

Taavi looked at the other elders on his side of the table. They all nodded. Sjund removed a lantern from the table in front of him. Taavi got the walkie-talkie.

“If a lantern is near you, bring it,” Sjund announced.

Sjund led all the elders from each clan outside; their guards followed each clan. A slight glow to the east gave an indication of the approaching dawn. Through the blowing snow, the group moved between the orderly rows of tents in the Denock camp. They entered a tent twice the size of the long house. A large earthen furnace occupied the center, its smokestack protruding through the roof. The metal workers were gone, but red coals still burned inside. Sjund stopped by the bare frame of a wagon. The wooden beams were thick and interlocked with metal brackets; the large wood-spoked wheels were half Sjund’s height. In the center of the frame, mounted to metal rails, stood a metal cone. The diameter and depth of the hollow cone were as big as Sjund was tall. At the apex of the cone was a five-centimeter hole.

“This is the war wagon,” Sjund announced loudly so the whole group could hear. Sjund pointed to a stack of metal plates by the wagon. “These plates will be attached to the outside and top of the frame, creating an enclosure for protection. My assistants and I will drive it to the appropriate place against the exterior of the wall. Once the nitroglycerin is made and poured into canteens, the canteens will be attached to the inside of the cone and a stick of dynamite, placed in the hole, will be used to detonate them. We will slide the opening of the cone flush against the wall and then detach the back half of the wagon, and while the fuse burns we’ll retreat to a safe distance. The cone will focus the energy of the explosion. I know a spot where the wall is weak. We will breach it there.”

Sjund stood in front of Taavi. “You are correct; you are taking the brunt of the initial assault. I am sure we can agree to your proposed adjustment. Rest assured, my bomb will work.”

Taavi nodded. “And if we’re successful, and occupy the Tower, then the elders of our clan get first pick of the women captured, three for each elder—”

“And half the cattle and horses from the village, as agreed.” Tristan finished the alliance agreement for him. “But first, your man must make it inside the wall. Since he should’ve reported hours ago, I’ve sent other scouts to see if they could find any of your man’s tracks in the snow crossing the riverbed. I expect their report at any time.”

Taavi nodded again. He looked at Sjund. “You are from the clan with the Tower. You don’t care that your father and the other elders, perhaps even their wives and children, will be killed?”

“If I could, I’d do it myself.”

“Why do you hate them so?”

“That clan is run by twisted old men that believe in ancient fables and laws. They care nothing of the people, only of their secret power source. All laws are contrived with its preservation at their core.

“I was in line to lead the clan. I didn’t believe in their superstitions, but I concealed it well enough. My plan was to one day take over the clan, then I would use the power to make life better. I fell in love and married. We had a son. Just the birth of my son violated their law. They killed my son and my wife. I couldn’t live among them after that,” Sjund answered.

Taavi gave a knowing frown. The door of the blacksmith’s tent flung open, cold wind and snow rushed inside, and the flames of the lanterns wavered. A Denock scout stepped inside and closed the door behind him. He pulled the hood of his parka back and removed the balaclava from his head. “We found the Asus soldier. He lay dead just this side of the riverbed. We brought his body back with us.”

“How would they know?” asked Taavi.

“It could just have been a random encounter. We’ve lost several men to snipers this year,” Tristan said.

The men became uneasy. Sjund looked at the reporting scout. “Did you find his backpack with him, or his radio or knife?”

“No, sir,” the scout replied.

The Asus elders whispered among themselves.

“Take three other scouts and retrieve both repeater stations from the hilltops,” Tristan commanded the scout.

“Yes, sir,” he replied and left the tent.

“It’s safe to assume we have lost the advantage of surprise,” Taavi said. “We are going to return to our camp to reconsider the situation before deciding to go to war upon the clan behind the wall alongside you.”

“We should attack at once,” Sjund said, “before they have a chance to prepare and before winter makes it impossible to be outside!”

The Asus elders whispered some more. Taavi looked at Sjund. “We will discuss it tomorrow.” He and the other Asus elders filed out the door into the predawn light, followed by their guards.

Tristan waved at his guards to leave the tent. When they were all gone, Sjund spoke. “You should’ve let me go,” he said to Tristan.

“And what good will you be to us if you are dead? You’re the only person who knows how to make the nitroglycerin and attach it properly to this damn cone on this wagon. More importantly, besides your father, you’re the only one who knows how to start the machine—the reactor. And I am sure your father would die before he showed us.” Tristan leaned against a wagon wheel.

“We should attack now. The longer we wait the more they can prepare—and the worse this damn cold winter is getting,” Sjund insisted.

“And so can we. A few more days won’t matter. It’ll be just as cold for the Tower clan as it is for us on the battlefield. Besides, the loss of surprise may be a good thing. A few less Asus soldiers we have to deal with in the future. But I am sure they’ll want a bigger share of the cattle and horses after the battle is over.”

“You should give them whatever they want to get them to join with us. And do it quickly,” Sjund said. “It has taken us five years to get enough materials for a bomb the size needed for this wagon. Now we have the advantage in numbers, and I don’t want to spend another miserable winter in a tent. The way this winter is going we could all be dead if we don’t either get the reactor for heat and the stone dwellings for the soldiers or move south.”

“And what of the legend of the reactor?” Tristan asked. “The history keepers told us as children that the Tower clan is waiting for a signal from the stars to start the reactor. They are keeping it for themselves, never to be used and never to be shared with outsiders. You’re sure it really exists and is as powerful as the legend says?”

“Oh yes, it is real—I have seen it. It’s capable of supplying enough power to have electricity in every dwelling, for lights and heat for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years.”

All the Denock elders nodded and smiled, envisioning life inside a warm stone dwelling.

“But,” Sjund said, interrupting their dreaming. All the elders stared at him. “The legend is also correct about a signal from the stars. They have been waiting for it for centuries. Should this convoluted old man think he has received one, he will start the reactor. His plan is to use all the fuel rods. If he starts the reactor, then even if we capture the Tower and kill all the village’s soldiers, we won’t be able to use it to make much electricity, and therefore no weapons or heat. The reactor will be next to useless.”

“Why would he do this?” Tristan asked.

Sjund looked at the other elders and then finally at Tristan. “He’s insane. He thinks he can use it to travel back in time.”

****

Alyd looked at Timo nervously. At two hours before sunrise, a knock at the door couldn’t be good. Timo, shaving, nearly cut his cheek with the new knife. He wiped his face, returned the knife to its sheath, and placed it under the mattress of the bed. Their dwelling was one room, besides a small separate bathroom. There was a dining area, fireplace for warmth and cooking, and a bed tucked away in a corner. In another corner stood a large, metal cabinet. All members of the sniper unit had one of these installed in their dwelling after graduation. In this case, since the two snipers were married, they shared. It securely held all their gear and explosives. It wasn’t large enough for their rifles since they had to share. The rifles leaned against the wall to the left of the cabinet. Pistol belts hung from hooks above the rifles. The walls were stone with a single shuttered window next to the front door, a low wood-slat ceiling, and wooden floors. It was the standard village dwelling layout. Only high-ranking officials had separate rooms for bedrooms, and some even had a separate kitchen. Neither Timo nor Alyd had friends that ranked that high. Alyd, fully dressed in her uniform, sat in one of the two chairs at the only table. She had just finished lacing up her boots.

Timo unlocked and opened the door. A man he didn’t know stood outside holding a flashlight, its beam directed at his feet; the indirect light provided enough illumination for the men to see each other clearly. Timo looked him up and down. Only military officers or special operations soldiers had flashlights. If he was one of them, Timo would have at least known his face. The man wasn’t wearing a military uniform; instead he wore a black leather jacket with white trim along the cuffs and sleeves. Only staff members of the High Council wore those.

“Yes?” Timo said.

“I am a messenger from the High Council. The council orders you and your wife’s appearance at an assembly in the Five-Seven-One Chamber at eleven hundred hours,” the man said.

“But we’re supposed to report for sniper patrol in an hour.”

“Your commanding officer has been notified, and your patrol duties have been reassigned. Bring no weapons to the meeting,” the messenger said.

“Thank you,” Timo said and shut the door.

“I told you—” Alyd said.

Timo held his index finger to his lips. He walked over to the table and sat in the other chair.

Alyd leaned over in her chair toward him. “I told you that you shouldn’t have kept that knife,” she whispered.

“This isn’t about the knife. The High Council wouldn’t care about a knife.”

“What is it then?” Alyd asked.

“It must be about that scout and why we didn’t bring the body back.”

“I still can’t believe you did this. You know it won’t be just you who goes to prison. They’ll think I went along with it. I don’t like it. It makes me nervous. We should throw it away.”

“We’re not throwing it away. You’re worrying about nothing,” Timo answered. Timo stood and finished dressing. “At least we don’t have to start the day on patrol.”

Alyd didn’t answer. As he laced up his boots, Timo felt the silence from her fill the room.

“What do you want me to do? I can’t go back and tell the general now.”

“At least hide it in a better place than under the mattress.”

****

Timo looked up at the Tower. It stood one hundred meters west of the Five-Seven-One chamber. The Tower was a square building, fifty meters wide and long, made of large granite cubes. At a height of forty-five meters, it loomed over all the other one-story dwellings and shops in the village. A single set of oversized metal doors on the south side provided the only entry. Halfway up the Tower on the north side were two vents that constantly released a lazy column of white steam. The steam drifted away from the Tower vertically in the breeze, and then broke apart into small cloudlets that reminded Timo of the cotton-like clouds on a sunny day during the growing season. Just below the top of the Tower, on each of the four sides, protruded a large loudspeaker. Timo did not know what purpose these had. A two-meter-tall security barrier ringed the Tower, and a heavily armed special police force provided security. Only the council and family members were allowed inside. Like the wall that surrounded the village, the Tower took decades to complete, centuries ago.

The doors to the chamber were opened by two security officers. Timo and Alyd walked into the room and the doors shut behind them. The room had no windows. The stone walls and floor were illuminated by electrical lamps mounted on the walls. Neither of them had seen electrical lighting inside before. In the room was a long table, and seated there, facing them, were the five members of the High Council.

Maldor, by far the oldest member, had pale, blotchy skin and clear blue eyes to match his razor-sharp mind. His stern, clean-shaven face glared at them. There were a few short sprouts of white hair on top of his head. He reminded Timo of an angrier version of a school principal. He was the Engineering and Science director and keeper of the historical records for the clan. He motioned to two stone stools before him with his hand. “Please have a seat.”

Timo and Alyd did as they were instructed.

“We’ve summoned you here to enquire about the man you killed yesterday,” Maldor said. “Timo, would you recount the event to us?”

Timo could always tell when Alyd was nervous because she got very still and a small vein protruded on her forehead. At this moment she was more rigid than the stone stool she sat upon, and the vein was clearly visible. Couldn’t we get a stool with some padding? Timo thought.

“We were on sniper patrol in sector twenty-seven. We’d been there since before daylight, to relieve team-five. We had seen nothing until this contact. Alyd acted as spotter. I was behind the rifle. About four hours into the shift, Alyd spotted movement in a ravine across the riverbed. We watched it carefully and determined it to be rock camouflage, known to be used by enemy scouts. I fired one round into the camouflage cover, striking the scout in both legs. He came out of the cover and attempted to crawl to a nearby boulder. I fired a second round, killing him on the spot.”

“Alyd, is that how you recall the events?” Maldor asked.

Timo looked at her. The vein is still there.

Alyd stayed stiff. “Yes, sir,” she replied.

“Continue,” Maldor instructed.

“We reported the contact and were told to conduct normal intel retrieval. We waited for darkness and did that. When we returned to the village we gave what we recovered to General Bartel.”

Bartel leaned his broad, thick chest and shoulders forward in his seat. “You were not instructed to bring the body back to the village?”

“No, sir. We were told to do normal intel retrieval,” Timo replied.

“Timo and Alyd,” Maldor interjected before Bartel could ask another question. “We are not here today to blame anyone for anything, nor are we going to give out any punishment. And nothing you say here will be told to your commanding officers. We are simply seeking the truth about what happened yesterday. Do you understand?”

They both nodded. Please, Alyd, don’t say a thing.

“Was there anything unusual about the man you killed?”

“He was an Asus soldier, but he was dressed in Denock gear,” Timo said. “After we got back, the general sent another team to retrieve the body. You can see it for yourself.”

“That’s part of the problem,” Maldor said. “When the sniper team got to the location you reported, there wasn’t a body there. They found a large amount of blood and three sets of boot prints leading to the west but no body. So, you see, the testimony of the both of you is all we have,” Maldor said.

“We recovered a backpack full of intel,” Alyd said.

“And it had a strange-looking walkie-talkie inside. Certainly that must be of some use. Have you seen that?” Timo asked.

Maldor removed the walkie-talkie from a pocket of his jacket and placed it on the table. “We have received those items,” Maldor said. “The radio is unique. It appears to have a way to encode the radio signal it transmits. No way our scanners would pick the signal up. It could have other features of which we are unaware. We will continue to examine it and the other items in the pack. Besides those items, did you recover anything else, from his person or in his pockets?”

Timo could feel Alyd stop breathing.

“No, sir,” Timo said.

“Is there any other relevant information either of you would like to add?”

“No, sir,” Timo said.

Maldor looked at Alyd; so did Timo.

“No, sir,” she said.

Piet, a short, round man with no neck and long black hairwho oversaw the manufacturing of glass, electronics, metals, ammunition, and armaments, spoke to Maldor.

“My concern is the radio. The technology is new; the manufacturing is better than anything we have. If they can do that with a radio, they can do it with weaponry.”

“I doubt they made it,” Maldor said. “More likely it is the spoils of a conflict with a clan from their home territory.”

Next, Eduart, the youngest member, with brown hair and a chiseled jaw who managed agriculture production and village civil maintenance, chimed in. “If they have formed an alliance, they would more than triple our number of soldiers. Maybe not enough to breach our wall, but certainly enough to put us under siege. We barely have enough food stored to get us through the winter—if the coming winter isn’t too severe. If they keep us penned inside the wall through early spring, we won’t be able to get the crops planted in time. We’ll starve.”

Suddenly Timo felt irrelevant—it was a relief. Alyd still sat rigid.

“Sjund won’t wait. Time is not on his side. He is going to attack, sooner rather than later. Bartel, double the number of the wall sentries,” Maldor said.

“How can you be so sure?” Bartel asked.

Maldor looked at Bartel. “I know how my son thinks. I know what his motivations are. An attack is coming. He knows the perils of staying this far north in the winter. He’ll throw everything he has at our defenses. Of course, his main goal will be the Tower. Double the number of guards per shift. Prepare your men for war.” Maldor looked at Piet. “Make sure the ammunition production is operating as efficiently as possible, three shifts per day.”

“I will,” Piet said, “but it would be a great help if I could get more electricity.”

“Three hours a day is all we can spare. The rest of the day has to be by hand,” Maldor said.

Svart looked the physical opposite of Piet—very slim, very tall, with short blond hair. He spoke next. “I would like to plead again to the council that once the winter is over, we abandon the village and move the people farther south where the growing season lasts longer. I have spoken to Piet extensively and he is in agreement. The harvest was down over ten percent this season.”

“We cannot move. You know that. We must stay here with the reactor,” Maldor said.

“We’ll all die here waiting for you to use the reactor,” Svart snapped. “You don’t even know it will work.”

“I am not debating this with you again. It will work—the science is sound,” Maldor said.

“Sound?” Piet shot back. “This is a theory that is centuries old. You want to talk about science? I have been collecting data for years now, and without a doubt the growing season is shrinking and the winter is growing and the rate of this change is accelerating. I predict this one will be the worst ever. What are we going to do when roofs are collapsing from the weight of the snow and ice? When the cattle and horses freeze to death and have to be slaughtered? What good will the reactor be if we are all dead?”

“Excuse me?” Alyd said.

Suddenly the council members were aware of what they were debating in front of two soldiers.

“If war is coming to our village, can we go?” Alyd asked.

“I believe we are finished with you. I have spoken to your C.O.; you have the rest of the day off. You are dismissed,” Maldor said.

The rest of the council remained silent.

The sounds of their footsteps echoed in the room as they left. As soon as the doors shut behind him, Timo could hear the muffled arguing continue.