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DEATH DAY MINUS 155

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2020

And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power.

—REVELATIONS 9:1–2,

Holy Bible

NEWPORT, OREGON

The cities of New York, Paris, Moscow, Madrid, Cairo, Beijing, Sydney, Lima, Rio de Janeiro, Johannesburg, Tehran, and New Delhi were already in flames by the time the people of Earth realized they were under attack. Skyscrapers toppled, apartment buildings exploded, bridges collapsed, housing tracts were incinerated, forests were consumed by fire, and pillars of black smoke speared the sky.

The nations of Earth wasted precious minutes hurling accusations at each other, and two actually launched missiles before they realized the nature of their mistake and tried to abort. But it was too late … and the cities of Bombay and Islamabad vanished in the twinkling of an eye.

The truth was that the attack originated from space, from the great blackness that started just beyond the planet’s atmosphere, and extended past the edge of the galaxy. Monsters, the same ones that children so wisely fear, had finally arrived. And they were bad, very bad, which was why more than three billion people died in less than three days.

Those who survived, who lived to endure the days ahead, would remember Black Friday in a variety of different ways. For Jack Manning it was the noise, the sound of sonic booms that rolled across the land, each one overlapping the last, like the hammers of hell.

He was on vacation near Newport, Oregon, when the thunder started to roll and contrails clawed the sky. The wind caused his eyes to tear as Manning looked upward. There were others on the beach, not many given the time of year, but a thin scattering of tourists salted with locals. They shaded their eyes against the glare and pointed toward dots that raced out over the Pacific. Most assumed it was some sort of military exercise—role-playing for the kind of war that no one expected anymore.

The first hint of what was actually taking place came from an older man in a yellow windbreaker. The words “The North Face” were emblazoned over his left breast pocket. A cloud of windblown hair danced around his ruddy face. He waved his unicom like a high-tech talisman. His voice was hopeful, as if the tall, lean stranger might be able to explain the news, or make it go away. “Have you seen this nonsense? These idiots claim Portland is under attack! But that’s impossible! My daughter works there … not far from Powell’s bookstore. Here … look at this.”

Manning looked at the little screen and was amazed by what he saw. The video quality was pretty good considering where they were. The old Pittock Mansion was on a hill west of downtown Portland. A guy named Frank had gone there to get a better view. Now, thanks to a home videocamera and his wireless connection to the Web, Frank’s video was available worldwide. The footage managed to be both horrible and awe-inspiring at the same time. The two men watched as three aircraft, one the size of a city block, systematically destroyed the city. The attackers used energy weapons, high-explosive bombs, and a variety of missiles to do their bloody work. The new fifty-story Willamette office tower took a direct hit, folded like a tube of wet cardboard, and fell on the Morrison bridge. The span collapsed into the river. Boats, barges, and other debris were swept downstream and into the wreckage, where they were trapped. A dam started to form. “Jeez,” the man named Frank said feelingly, “somebody needs to stop these bastards.”

A windblown shout carried down the beach. Manning looked up into the sky. One of the black specks wheeled, did a nose-over, and dove for the beach. He could have run, should have run, but there was nowhere to go. The nearest cover was more than half a mile away. Manning had never felt so exposed—so vulnerable. The blob grew into a delta-shaped hull and roared overhead. It was so low they could feel the wind created by its passage and read the hieroglyphics on the fuselage. Engines howled. Both men turned to watch it depart. The ship pulled up, climbed at an amazing rate of speed, and was gone. The boom followed a few seconds later.

“Damn!” the man said. “Did you see that? It looked like the ones on TV. Who are they? The Chinese?”

As with most members of his particular profession, Manning knew a thing or two about military aircraft. “No,” he answered slowly. “The Chinese don’t have anything like that.”

“Then who?” the older man demanded desperately. “Who do the planes belong to?”

“I don’t know,” Manning replied grimly, “but I doubt they’re human.”

The older man’s jaw dropped, and remained that way, as Manning turned and walked away. Thunder rolled—and the human race continued to die.

McCHORD AFB, WASHINGTON

The conference room was long and narrow, like the table that ran its length, and looked out over a semicircular space. There wasn’t much doubt who the facility belonged to, since the Air Mobility Command’s shield dominated the front wall. It consisted of a globe, wings, and a clutch of arrows.

Like the rest of the AMC, McChord’s team was dedicated to putting equipment and supplies wherever the rest of the military wanted them to go. That included airborne refueling for the air force, navy, marine corps, and allied aircraft as well. The areas to either side of the AMC shield were covered with the new Sony-manufactured “video wallpaper” that allowed the thirty-six officers and enlisted people who staffed the Tactical Operations Center, or TOC, to “post” images in any manner they chose.

Though the Air Mobility Command was headquartered at Scott AFB in Illinois, the functions of the Tanker Airlift Control Center, or TACC, could be duplicated elsewhere, and McChord was one of those places. And, while they were doing the best job they could, their efforts had been hampered by a lack of what computers need most: reliable data.

In spite of the fact that the TOC was more than five stories below ground level, and was hardened against nuclear, biological, and chemical attack, those individuals lucky enough to be there—and that included Alexander Ajani Franklin, the governor of Washington State—could still feel the reverberations of the powerful subnuclear explosions. They shook dust out of the light fixtures, made coffee shiver in cups, and sent a stylus tumbling to the highly polished floor.

General Charles “Coop” Windgate bent to pick it up. He’d been up for more than forty-eight hours, but his uniform looked like it had just come off a hanger, and his shoes were mirror-bright—just as they had been every day for the twenty-seven years he’d spent in the air force. He surfaced with pen in hand. “Damn the bastards anyway…. How many bombs do they have?”

Others were present as well: Jina Claire Franklin, the governor’s wife; Major Linda Holmes, the general’s adjutant; and Michael Olmsworthy, secretary of the air force. None of them replied. None had to. The answer was obvious. The extraterrestrials—or XTs, as many had taken to calling them—had enough bombs to reduce the entire country to burning rubble, and assuming the reports from abroad were reliable, the rest of the world as well. Why? Nobody knew. If the aliens had the means to communicate, they hadn’t bothered to do so.

Holmes sat in front of an IBM “Cyber Warrior” field-ready portable. It was waterproof, shockproof, and damned near bulletproof. She touched an earplug and cocked her head to one side. Holmes had short black hair, serious brown eyes, and a thin-lipped mouth. She listened for a moment, murmured an acknowledgment into the boom mike, and bit her lower lip. Governor Franklin had never seen an air force officer cry but sensed she was about to.

“Well?” Windgate demanded. “Spit it out.”

Holmes struggled to control the tremor in her voice. “Sir, that was the com center. They caught a relay from a nuclear sub. Air Force One went down near Kansas City. Some sort of energy weapon was fired from orbit. Air Force Two was attacked and destroyed on the way back from Panama City. No known survivors.”

“Were the planes targeted?” Windgate asked. “That would tell us something.”

“No,” the major replied. “It doesn’t sound that way. Preliminary reports suggest that the XTs have downed thousands of civilian and military aircraft. Average life of a fighter after launch is just twenty-five seconds. They kill anything that moves. The missle command tried to launch nukes—but every silo was plastered before they could get a shot off.”

Jina Franklin tried to swallow the enormous lump that had formed in her throat. The president and her husband, the vice president and his wife, all of them dead. She felt a terrible sense of loss—for the country, for their families, and for herself. Tears trickled down her cheeks. Her husband’s hand closed over hers. The grip was tight, too tight, but she made no attempt to escape it. His voice was controlled. “And the Speaker? Do we have any word on him?”

“No,” Holmes replied, “I’m afraid we don’t. That’s not too surprising, though, since Washington, D.C., was almost completely destroyed. If the Pentagon issued any orders, they haven’t reached us.”

There was a long moment of silence as they absorbed the news. “So,” Windgate said finally, his eyes swinging to Olmsworthy, “who’s holding the bag?”

The secretary was a onetime CEO of Boeing, an old friend of the president’s, and a grandfather three times over. That’s where his mind was—with his children and his grandchildren. It was chance, pure chance that his plane had landed at McChord to refuel, and been on the ground at the moment of attack. He should be dead by now, blown to bits, or fried to a crisp. More than that, he wanted to be dead—if that’s what it would take to be with his family. Olmsworthy’s eyes were red with fatigue, fields of white stubble covered both cheeks, and his suit was badly wrinkled. He forced his mind to focus. “No, I don’t think so. I’m an appointee. I’d say the governor’s the one you want. People voted for him.”

Slowly, but with the surety of a compass needle seeking true north, all eyes went to Franklin. He had good hair, cut short without a trace of gray, medium brown skin, even features, and a mouth that was normally ready to smile. Not now, though, and not for some time to come. He shook his head. “Thanks, but no thanks. I’m no expert on matters of succession—but it seems to me that I’m in the wrong branch of government.”

Holmes tapped the last few keys and waited for a response. The XTs had neutralized most of the government’s considerable inventory of com and spy sats during the first five minutes of the attack. There was still plenty of buried cable, however, and in spite of the fact that some had been cut, there was plenty of redundancy, and that, plus her high-priority military “push,” got Holmes through to the State Department’s home page. She cleared her throat. “It looks like the governor is correct, sir: The secretary of defense is fourth in line after the Speaker of the House, and, in a situation where the attorney general and the other secretaries are killed, responsibility devolves to the next level of administrators. You’re fourth … right after the secretary of the navy.”

Olmsworthy held his head in his hands. “Tell me this is a dream … some sort of horrible nightmare.”

Windgate didn’t seem to hear. He held up his hand. “Listen … the bombing has stopped.”

There was a moment of silence as everyone sought to verify what the general had said. A minute passed but nothing was heard. Satisfied that he was correct, Windgate turned to Holmes. “Get Jeski on the horn … tell him to activate roamers one through five. We need a sit rep.”

Holmes looked alarmed. Sealed in their underground command post and with no satellites to rely on, the high-flying drones were the only sources of visual input they had left. All had been launched immediately after McChord came under attack, and they seemed to have escaped notice. “The Ts could home in on the signals, sir, and blow the roamers out of the sky.”

“The thought had occurred to me,” Windgate answered sarcastically, “but so fucking what? The roamers will run out of fuel in about two hours and we’ll lose them anyway.”

Not roamers four and five, Holmes thought, because they’re solar-powered. But there was only one response she could properly give—and the officer gave it. “Sir, yes, sir.”

“Step over to the window,” the general ordered, “and let’s take a look.” A motor whined, and the Plexiglas barrier fell as the civilians lined the newly created opening. Jina marveled at the discipline of men and women below. Here they were, doing their jobs, knowing that wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, and in some cases sons and daughters were most likely dead. It was the most courageous thing she had ever witnessed.

There was a stir on the floor as new images appeared on the gently curved wall. For all their professionalism and attention to duty, the TOC’s staff were just as curious regarding “out there” as their commanding officer was.

Each rectangle of video was identified by the name of the drone from which it came, a plain English description of the area under surveillance, and a line of zeros where precise coordinates should have appeared. Like so much of the technology they had come to rely on, the Global Positioning System (GPS) was a thing of the past.

So, due to limitations of range and the fact that the drones had been launched at McChord, none was more than about three hundred nautical miles away—that in spite of ranges that could extend to fifteen hundred nautical miles under OTH (over-the-horizon) operational procedures. But without sats to link everything together, line-of-sight transmission was the best that any of them could hope for.

Two of the units were solar-powered Gnat 1150s, both having a 250-pound payload, capable of staying aloft for up to a week, assuming they received enough sunlight. Something in short supply, what with fires burning all around the globe.

The other three were heavier craft, direct descendants of the General Atomics “Predator” series, each having up to sixty hours’ worth of endurance at an altitude of thirty thousand feet.

Windgate signaled to Holmes. “Tell Jeski to give us whatever he’s got.”

Holmes murmured into her mike. Down on the floor, in what was generally referred to as “the pit,” Captain “Jaws” Jeski nodded and tried to concentrate. He had brown hair, hazel eyes, and a strong, jutting jaw. It was badly in need of a shave. He’d been on duty for more than thirty-six hours and couldn’t stop thinking about his girlfriend. Was she alive? Or lying dead under a pile of debris? His voice was deceptively serene. The words boomed over the PA. “If you would direct your attention to the real-time image on the far left …”

Franklin did as the officer suggested and found himself looking down at what was, or had been, the city of Seattle. Smoke boiled up from a multitude of fires and served to blanket the metroplex. There were holes, however—and Predator Five took full advantage of them.

The first thing the politician looked for and couldn’t see was the 605-foot-tall Seattle Space Needle with which the city had long been identified. He assumed the problem was a matter of perspective at first, till Jina squeezed his hand. “Alex, look! The Needle is down!”

Franklin realized the truth, that the tower had fallen to the east and lay pointed toward the foot of Capitol Hill. The landmark had survived the quake of ‘09, in which dozens of buildings had been flattened. Now it was down.

But that wasn’t all—not by a long shot. The new Aurora Bridge, completed only two years before, had collapsed into the Lake Union ship canal. Roughly half the downtown area had been slagged, although the top five stories of the Microsoft tower, including its much-discussed transparent dome, still poked up through the roiling smoke. A two-mile stretch of the partially elevated I-5 freeway was down, the “condo farm” that dominated the Denny Regrade area was burning, and nothing moved.

Jeski chose that moment to order an increase in magnification, and the streets seemed to leap upward. There were M&M–colored cars, plenty of them, but most were stationary. A slowly winding river of people snaked along the main arterials, surging toward the heavily damaged freeway.

Habit? Because that’s the way they normally moved around? Or pragmatism, because damaged or not, highways offered the fastest way out of town? It didn’t matter.

Another picture appeared. Rather than circling as the first drone had, this one was headed south, right over McChord, Fort Lewis, and the capital in Olympia.

Windgate, who expected the worst but was still eager to see how badly his base had been damaged, was appalled by the extent of the destruction. It appeared as if the XTs knew the military bases were a threat and had been careful to target them. The administrative buildings, housing, and hangars had all been leveled.

Worse, from a pilot’s point of view, the runways were so tom up that none of the general’s tubby Lockheed Martin “Load Warriors” would be able to take off or land. Assuming any were left—which seemed doubtful. Those not destroyed on the ground had been forced to ditch at sea or land on any kind of airfield they could find. They were theoretically capable of landing on a 750-foot strip, but that was under ideal conditions, which didn’t apply here.

“Holy shit!” someone said. “What the hell is that?”

Holmes couldn’t believe her eyes. The object in question was huge, so huge that it obliterated the Gnat’s view of the ground as it nosed into the picture.

“It’s one of their ships,” Windgate said dully. “One of their smaller ships.”

Franklin stared in wonder as the alien vessel slid in under the drone’s belly. Though it was too large to see properly, the politician had the impression of a delta-shaped hull, along with various fins, fairings, and other structures that gave texture to a surface otherwise aerodynamically smooth. The sight of the ship inspired both awe and terror. How could the human race possibly survive the onslaught of such machines? Was this the end?

Light winked from the top of the black matte hull. “Uh-oh,” Holmes exclaimed. “We need to break it off…. They know the roamer is up there and—”

The sentence went unfinished. The Gnat exploded, the video vanished, and the other images winked out one after another. The drones were gone.

Silence reigned for only a moment, as a technician broke into tears. Windgate swore and shook his head. “Damn the bastards, anyway. If only—”

“Sorry to interrupt, sir,” Captain Jeski said over the PA, “but we have an incoming transmission.”

Windgate looked hopeful. Could help be on the way? “Really? Who is it?”

Jeski looked up at the window. “It’s them. The aliens. The message is in English.”

The general struggled to conceal his disappointment. There would be no help … just aliens who spoke English. The “how” seemed unimportant. “All right, then—what do the bastards want?”

Jeski liked old movies and would have smiled if the circumstances had been different. But they weren’t, so what might have been funny wasn’t. “They want to meet our leader, sir. Up top in thirty minutes.”

NEWPORT, OREGON

The Agate Beach parking lot was only half full. A group of people stood next to an RV, shaded their eyes, and pointed into the sky. It was cold … and all of them were bundled up. Manning fumbled for the Hertz remote and pointed toward the maroon SUV. The motor started, the lights flashed, and the door popped open. Lots of conveniences. More than he needed.

Manning climbed inside, opened the United Nations-issue Kevlar soft-sided briefcase, and removed the phone. It was linked to an entire fleet of low-orbit satellites and would work from anyplace in the world. Some very heavy stuff was coming down, and the secretary-general would need protection—had protection, since the team he led would be at her side. Comforting, but not the same as being there himself, which, in spite of the accusations leveled against him, was where Manning wanted to be.

Manning pressed the power button, entered an access code, followed that with a three-digit priority “push,” and waited for the call to connect. Nothing.

The security officer swore, switched to the terrestrial PCS system, and entered another sequence of numbers. There was no dial tone, and a “no service” message appeared on the screen. Something cold filled his gut. The XTs, because that’s what they obviously were, had destroyed the entire communications system in what? Hours? It didn’t bode well.

Manning secured his seat belt, pulled out of the lot, and headed north on Highway 101. The United States wouldn’t cave without striking back, he felt certain of that, and there would be a need for people like him. People who could fight.

There wasn’t much traffic, not at first, and the security chief made fairly good time up through Lincoln City, and on toward Tilamook. Then he hit Winenna Beach, saw what looked like a parking lot up ahead, and hit the brakes.

Three alien fighters, miniature versions of the ship he’d seen earlier, flashed overhead. Bright blue energy beams stuttered toward the north, a tanker truck exploded, and a ball of fire floated upward. The booms came so close together they were nearly indistinguishable.

The tanker was blocking the highway, which made it impossible to move. Not only that, but the fighters could return at any moment. People bailed out of their vehicles and started to run.

Manning considered heading in the opposite direction, checked his rearview mirror, and discovered that fifteen or twenty vehicles had pulled in behind him. It was hopeless. Even if he could turn around, even if he fled toward the south, there would be other traffic jams.

The security officer turned the engine off, got out of the SUV, and opened the back. He had a single suitcase and no intention of lugging it around. Most of the contents were what he thought of as “vacation crap,” meaning clothes he wouldn’t normally wear, books he wouldn’t actually read, and postcards he wouldn’t send. All part of a vacation he’d been ordered to take in the wake of what the press called “The Pretoria Massacre,” a fifteen-minute gun battle in which Manning and his team had gone head-to-head with eight heavily armed assassins and killed every one of them. That made him a hero to some … and a villain to others—especially since he was white, the assassins were black, and there were rumors that some of them had been “capped.” An allegation no one had been able to prove—but it now stained his reputation. That’s why he was in Oregon instead of New York on this day.

There were some useful items among the “vacation crap,” however, including the Smith & Wesson .40-caliber sidearm he was authorized to carry in most nations around the world, two backup mags holding fourteen rounds each, an anodized Tecna Lite-3, a small first-aid kit, and the day pack he used as a carry-on. Those items, plus a sweater and gloves, completed his kit. Not exactly combat-ready—but better than hauling the TUMI around.

The plan, such as it was, involved a hike to Portland, some sort of high-priority flight to New York, and a reunion with the rest of his team. People who, along with his seldom-seen sister, provided his connection with the world. At least Marta would be safe—given where she was.

There didn’t seem to be much chance that the Hertz Corporation would be able to recover the SUV, not anytime soon, but it was in his nature to lock the doors.

That accomplished, Manning swung the pack onto his back, turned toward the north, and started to walk. The exercise felt good.

DENVER, COLORADO

The Abco Uniform company maintained a locker room for the convenience of its male employees. The door opened, and a man entered. He had dark hair, long sideburns, and a carefully trimmed mustache. A small goatee completed the look. His features were even, some said handsome, but lacked warmth. Perhaps it was the hard, cold eyes—or the mouth that rarely smiled. A woman had tried to figure that out once but given up, a decision her family heartily endorsed.

The man’s chrome-toed combat style boots clacked as he walked down an aisle guarded by two rows of lockers. His feet were small—too small, according to the boys in the sixth grade—and the lace-up boots helped to compensate for that fact.

Ivory wasn’t his real name, but it was the one he had chosen, both because it was more attractive than Kreider, and because it made a statement about his Christian identity, and the essential whiteness that marked him as special. The color of purity, of truth, of goodness.

Still, it said “Kreider” on his Social Security card, which meant that it said “Kreider” in the company’s records, which meant it said “Kreider” on his olive-drab locker. The letters were picked out in white.

Ivory looked left and right, assured himself that he was alone, and opened the padlock. The door squeaked as he pulled it open. The interior was arranged with military precision—one of many things he admired about the army, even if they had kicked him out. The pen was right where he’d left it. Or was it a sword? Yes, any instrument capable of inflicting damage on the enemy qualified as the righteous sword of God.

Quickly, so as to beat the rest of the shift out of the locker room, Ivory removed the company’s blue overalls and donned his street clothes. Then, when everything was ready, he took the pen and closed the locker. With that accomplished, it was time to take one last look around. Nothing. Good. He needed the money—and didn’t want to get fired. Not again. Not so soon.

Ivory moved with the surety of a man who knows exactly what he’s doing. The black man’s locker was next to the door. The letters said “Jones,” as if African slaves were from England and entitled to Anglo-Saxon names. Ivory stepped up, drew a much-practiced swastika, and wrote “nigger” below it. The cap made a satisfying “click” as it mated with the marker.

Ivory wanted to run, wanted to fill the hole at the bottom of his stomach, but forced himself to stay. The black man was big and strong. There was little doubt about what would happen if he and his friends arrived. Ivory would suffer, as he had suffered before, and wake up in the hospital. But if he ran, if he surrendered to his fear, the nigger would win. Right now, right here, Ivory was the most powerful man in the world. Especially since he knew that the great Yahweh was watching and measuring his worth.

For five long, excruciating seconds the laundry worker forced himself to stand there, to admire his own handiwork, before turning away. The doorknob felt cold, his heart raced, and his mind was supernaturally clear. He felt invigorated, powerful, and important.

The door opened, a bomb detonated one block to the north, and the ground shook. Another person might have stood there, might have wasted precious seconds wondering what was happening, but not Ivory. He ran, cut left at the first corner he came to, and ran some more. The front of the building was more than eighty years old. Mortar cracked, bricks came loose, and masonry tumbled into the street.

Warned as if by some sixth sense, Ivory sprinted for safety but didn’t quite make it. Something heavy hit his shoulder, his feet went out from under him, and the sidewalk smacked his face. He experienced the full weight of the debris, felt the air leave his lungs, and knew he was going to die. Dust filled his nostrils, another explosion shook the city, and a siren started to wail.

Ivory felt hands grab his wrists, heard his belt buckle scrape along the pavement, and was pleased when the weight disappeared. Then, amazingly, unbelievably, he was free, and standing unsupported. The African-American’s hair and face were coated with light-colored mortar dust. He looked like a street mime. He held Ivory’s arm. “Are you okay? Damn! That was close.”

“Yeah,” Ivory replied, surprised to find that it was true. “Thanks.”

The black man looked as if he were going to say something more, but his wife spoke first. “Come on, honey. We’ve got to get the kids.”

The man nodded, waved to Ivory, and was swallowed by smoke.

Stunned by his brush with death and still in shock, Ivory stumbled down the street. His car, a twenty-year-old Toyota, had been crushed by a light standard. It was totaled. He continued to move. People ran for cover, explosions threw columns of debris into the air, and aircraft crisscrossed the sky. They looked different, foreign somehow, but it was hard to see.

A wino lurched out of a doorway, asked for spare change, and got the finger instead. After all, if there was anything worse than a nigger or a Jew, it was a white man who had failed his race. A blood-sucking parasite who, along with the homosexuals and drug addicts, should be erased for good.

A pickup loaded with injured schoolchildren lurched over a curb, circumvented a pile of concrete blocks, and bounced into the street. A man stood crying on a corner, a bike messenger wove his way through traffic, and thunder boomed.

The world had gone mad, totally mad, and Ivory blocked it out. He walked head down, ignored everything but the pavement in front of him, and left the worst of the chaos behind. Traffic lights were out, cars smashed into each other, and battery-powered burglar alarms bleated their warnings.

The weather was clear but cold, and Ivory regretted the fact that his coat remained in the Toyota.

Ivory made his way to Speer, followed that to I-25, and looked down onto the freeway. It was packed bumper-to-bumper, side-to-side, and nothing was moving. Some of the cars had burned themselves out, some were on fire, and most were abandoned. Thousands upon thousands of people were climbing over wrecks, winding their way among the still-burning hulks, trying to escape the danger. Most were headed south, toward their homes in ‘burbs such as Englewood, or to escape the bombing to the north. There was little choice but to join them.

Ivory followed the flow down onto the freeway, ignored the Hispanic woman who struggled to deal with three children, and started to walk. Someone had left their dog in the backseat of their car. It yapped as he passed. A teenager, his face alight, smashed a windshield. The state-of-the-art entertainment console would fetch top dollar if the idiot could find a buyer. A man, fully loaded backpack firmly in place, nodded and smiled. He’d been ready and was enormously pleased with himself. Screw the world, screw the boss, screw the job. He was free. Ivory trudged on.

It was dark by the time he made it to the Arapaho exit, followed a mob down the off ramp, and turned east. Two additional moons had appeared in the sky and threw a strange blue-green glow across the land. Fires burned for as far as the eye could see. The power grid had been destroyed, and outside of a few hardy souls stupid enough to run portable generators, there was no electric light. But they learned quickly enough—oh, yes they did—as the glows drew looters. The intermittent pop, pop, pop of small-arms fire signaled a dozen backyard wars. Ivory avoided such places, preferring the shadows to confrontation, moving as quickly as he could.

Finally, nearly dead on his feet, he approached the tacky little storefront that served as headquarters for the nascent White Rose Society. It was untouched. Luck? Certainly, although the fact that four heavily armed skinheads, or “skins,” stood in front of the building might have something to do with it as well.

A smallish group, fewer than the seven described in Ezekiel 9: 1–2, but adequate, and consistent with the principle of leaderless resistance that had protected his brothers and sisters for so long.

A flashlight bathed him in white. Two men rushed forward, grabbed Ivory’s arms, and practically carried him inside. The walls were covered with Hitler posters, black swastikas, and racist epithets. Two battery-powered lamps threw shadows toward the door.

First aid came in the form of an ice-cold Coors—the skins’ remedy for almost any injury. It tasted cold and crisp. Parker, who functioned as the group’s master at arms, raised a bushy eyebrow. He’d been a boxer once, and his nose was nearly flat. The word “Rahowa,” an acronym for “racial holy war,” had been tattooed across his forehead so that anyone who encountered him was forced to encounter his belief system as well. “Hate to say it, boss—but you look like hell. Where you been?”

So Ivory told them the story, except the way he told it, the black couple were white, and he rescued them. “So,” Ivory said, bringing the report to a close, “have you seen the news? What the hell is going on?”

The skins looked at Parker. He shrugged. “Cable went down more than two hours ago. The last thing they said had something to do with aliens. They dropped out of nowhere, took a notion to kick our ass, and proceeded to do so.”

Ivory looked from one face to the next. “Don’t bullshit me, Parker … this is serious.”

“I ain’t bullshitting you,” the skinhead replied stolidly, “it’s for real.”

“What about the air force? What are they doing?”

Bonner, better known as Boner, gestured with a can of beer. Some slopped onto the much-abused floor. “They ain’t doin’ shit, not so far as we can tell, but who knows? Could be that they’re in on it.”

Ivory had done everything within his power to foster that kind of paranoia while avoiding such thinking himself. Why go for some complicated answer when the simple ones were generally right? No, the flyboys were outgunned, and that was that. The ZOG, the Zionist Occupational Government, was tits up, along with the police, military, and other structures created to support it.

Then it dawned on him: This was it! Armageddon, the fire from which the new order would be born! The very thing he had prophesized but never really believed in. From the ashes the true Israel would rise, Yahweh’s kingdom would be born, and Jesus would finally return.

Ivory was about to say something, about to share his insight, when he looked into their faces and realized they were ahead of him. What they wanted were orders. He nodded. “All right, then—this is the day we’ve been waiting for. What’s the status on the war wagon?”

“Out back,” Parker said proudly, “ready to rock ‘n’ roll.”

“Supplies?”

“On board.”

“Fuel?”

“Both tanks full.”

“Weapons?”

“Locked and loaded.”

Ivory downed the last of his beer, wiped his mouth with the back of a hand, and got to his feet. He felt dizzy but managed to hide it. Strength, or at least the perception of it, was critical to leadership. Hitler said so. “Let’s haul ass.”

Boner gave a whoop of pure joy, Parker grinned, and the others slapped each other on the back. Unseen, a cockroach emerged from the woodwork, decided the room was too bright, and retreated to his hole. His kind had been around for millions of years and would be for millions more. Darkness would fall … and he would feed.

ABOARD THE SAURON SHUTTLE OR SU, OR USEFUL, FIVE THOUSAND UNITS OVER THE PLANET NOW DESIGNATED AS HAVEN

The ship shuddered as it dropped through some choppy air, and the Sauron pilot, a Kan named Hol-Zee, waited for the almost inevitable reprimand. A Zin master named Hak-Bin occupied the single thronelike passenger seat and would almost certainly interpret the momentary discomfort as a personal affront. The Zin were like that, a fact that Zee had never bothered to question. After all, his chitin was a rich brown color, and while not as good as black, it was superior to white, or—and the Sauron could barely imagine it—light-colored fur. Such as Ra ‘Na slaves were born with.

Disgusted by his own imaginings, the warrior waited for the expected rebuke, gave thanks when nothing happened, and turned his attention to the landing. There were winds to contend with—not to mention layers of thick black smoke.

Hak-Bin, comfortably ensconced in a seat that had been custom-molded to his body, sat at the exact center of the cabin. He felt a series of bumps, considered the possibility of a reprimand, but couldn’t muster the necessary vil, the negative energy he would need to properly chastise the Kan. Things had gone well, very well, and try as he might, the Zin found it difficult to be anything but happy. The long, tension-filled journey was over. An appropriate planet had been located and would soon be ready.

The indigenous population represented something of a threat, especially since they outnumbered the Saurons thousands to one, but that problem had been addressed. The challenge was to control the Kan, who, though skilled at killing things, often resembled newly hatched Nymphs where their mental processes were concerned. Left to their own devices, the warriors would destroy all the humans, leaving no one to construct the citadels. Yes, there was little doubt that the great architect understood the nature of his creations, wisely setting Zin over Kan, Kan over Fon, and the Saurons over all other species.

The shuttle made an approach from the north, hit the surface of Spanaway Lake, and coasted toward the south. There was some sort of structure to the left, the purpose of which didn’t matter to the pilot, who was focused on landing the ship. Zee dropped the ship’s spoilers, allowed the ship to slow, and retracted them again. The impact was negligible, Hak-Bin’s mood remained intact, and the pilot gave thanks for his extraordinary run of luck.

None of the ships within the Sauron fleet had been designed by the aliens themselves. The shuttle was an excellent example. The Ra ‘Na came from a water-dominated world and engineered their ships accordingly. That being the case, the Saurons were accustomed to landing on water, which was fine so long as it was available and reasonably calm.

The shuttle slowed, Hak-Bin waited for a Fon functionary to unlatch his safety harness, and clacked his tripartite pincers. “Mok! Where are you? Come here immediately!”

Mok, who knew better than to come without being summoned, seemed to materialize at the Sauron’s side. Like most of her kind, she stood about four feet tall. She had a round head, a short muzzle, jet black eyes, and pointy ears. Short, blond-colored fur covered most of her body. Her hands, with webbing between each finger, were small and delicate.

Though not allowed to wear anything more elaborate than a simple uniformlike jerkin, Mok, along with many of her female friends, wore fancy underwear—an act of rebellion that the Zin was unaware of and would have regarded with lordly contempt. She kept her face carefully neutral. “Yes, master? What do you wish?”

“I wish to stand, and having done so, to leave the ship,” Hak-Bin said crossly. “You will attend me to ensure that technical matters are taken care of.”

“Yes, master,” Mok replied evenly. “Will you require a translator?”

The humans were a voluble race, and clever beings that they were, the Ra ‘Na had recorded countless variations of their mostly meaningless blather, analyzed the results, written the necessary programs, and downloaded the resulting software to thousands of wearable computers. The reply was nothing if not predictable. In spite of the fact that most of their claims to superiority were clearly specious, the Zin did have an unusual facility with spoken language, and had already mastered Haven’s dominant linguistic system. “No,” Hak-Bin snapped. “Such devices are intended for less capable beings such as the Kan, Fon, and Ra ‘Na.”

“Of course,” Mok replied smoothly, knowing full well that the Sauron might well have been furious had she failed to offer him the device he didn’t need. “I meant no offense.”

The Zin clacked his pincers impatiently. “Here—help me up.”

Hak-Bin was quite capable of standing unassisted, and both of them knew it. But by demanding such attentions, and receiving them, his position was continually reinforced.

Mok moved in, touched the release on the Zin’s safety harness, and took the Sauron’s chitin-covered arm. Hak-Bin levered himself to his feet. His long, oval-shaped head was crowned by three triangular plates that ran from front to back. As with all of his kind, the Sauron had large, light-gathering eyes; a wide, meat-eating mouth; and slits rather than external ears.

The rest of the Zin’s body consisted of a pod-shaped torso balanced on two deceptively slender legs, which were ideal for jumping. But this means of locomotion was rendered impossible due to the way Ra ‘Na ships were designed; so, that being the case, Hak-Bin was forced to engage in an awkward shuffling movement. A necessity that the Sauron and his peers not only resented, but found ways to punish the Ra ‘Na for. Their insistence on heavily decorated sedan chairs as a means of ground transportation was an excellent example of this. But no chair was available, and Hak-Bin would have rejected it regardless. He felt like walking—and proceeded to do so. The lock was aft and to the right. A milk-white Fon waited to assist him.

Meanwhile, a few hundred yards away, Alexander Franklin, along with his wife, General Windgate, and Secretary Olmsworthy, stood at the south end of Lake Spanaway, a small body of water adjacent to McChord. It was cold, damned cold, and the overnight frost had only recently surrendered to the wintry sun.

There was a snack bar on the right, complete with a sign that advertised “Sundaes, Cones, Bars, Hamburgers, and Fries,” plus a window placard that read “Open,” except that it wasn’t open, and never would be again.

A dock reached partway out into the lake from the left, as if eager to embrace returning boats, which were retrieved via the ramp sloping down into the dull gray water.

The humans watched in awe as the alien vessel came in for a landing. They had been summoned to the surface, met by more than fifty heavily armed alien troops, and transported to the lake. During the trip they learned there was a second set of XTs, smaller creatures who spoke via brooch-sized translators and seemed more than a little subservient.

The whole thing boggled the politician’s mind. After all the conjecture, the religious debates, the scientific pondering, the unmanned probes, the books, the movies, and the TV programs, here they were, the life forms everyone had speculated about, hoped for, and in some cases feared. Correctly feared, as things turned out.

Water foamed away from the spaceship’s bow as it touched down and coasted toward shore. Houses, still intact, could be seen on the far shore. They looked incredibly mundane with the alien space vessel plowing through the water in the foreground. It came to a stop about fifty yards from the beach, where it was met by a bargelike water craft that appeared to have been imported for that very occasion.

Intimidated by the presence of alien troops, the humans stood at something approaching attention as one of the XTs departed the confines of the ship, stepped onto the barge, and was transported to shore.

Jina noted that the newly arrived alien was insectoid. She was, or had been, a teacher, and that particular part of her persona was busy analyzing the aliens, or trying to, in hopes of deducing what sort of environment had given shape to them, and more importantly, how that might shape their psychology.

Windgate, his face a study in stony intransigence, ignored the alien dignitary and eyed the troops. Like most officers in his particular branch of the military, Windgate didn’t know a whole lot about infantry tactics, but some things were obvious.

The XTs had roughly the same mass as a human male, appeared to be somewhat less flexible, but possessed built-in body armor. Tough enough to stop a bullet? He would have welcomed the opportunity to find out.

It was too early to render any judgments about their weaponry, but, assuming that their small arms were on a par with their ships, it could be quite powerful indeed.

Secretary Olmsworthy eyed the approaching barge with a feeling of deep apprehension. What, if anything, could he do? He had read books about statecraft, hundreds of them, but most had one thing in common: They were written by winners. Human winners. What about losers? What could they teach him? The dead were mute.

The hull grated on the concrete ramp and crunched to a halt. Rather than jump the intervening gap, as either a Fon or a Kan would almost certainly do, Hak-Bin chose to make use of the makeshift gangplank that a gang of energetic Ra ‘Na hurried to put in place. Slow and deliberate—those were the hallmarks of good leadership.

Jina watched the alien’s awkward slide-step motion, concluded that it was not the optimum way for the XT to get around, and wished she could see more of its physiology.

But that was impossible, due to the pleated black skirt that hung from the creature’s waspish waist and swished around knobby knees. The rest of the alien’s clothing consisted of a heavy necklace made of what looked like stainless steel mesh, leather straps that crisscrossed an otherwise bare chest, and a pouch-belt decorated with metal studs.

Of nearly equal interest were the alien’s retainers—assuming that described the relationship. Two were of equal height and had an equivalent body mass. But their exoskeletons were light, almost white. The other alien’s chitin ranged from black—the obvious leader—through various shades of brown. A smaller and apparently unrelated alien stood off to one side. Like the group that handled the gangplank, he, she, or it was a good deal less intimidating.

Jina wanted to comment on these matters but knew the timing was wrong. She looked at her husband, saw his pleasant but rather bland expression, and knew his mind was churning. More than that, looking for some way to adapt, to survive, because Franklin was a born politician, and a man for whom the doing of deals was more than a way to get things done. It was an art plus a pleasure in and of itself. Would the aliens negotiate? There had been little sign of that—but there must be some purpose for the meeting. That’s what she hoped, anyway.

A crow cawed as Hak-Bin and his retainers made their way up the ramp. It was uncomfortably cold, but Hak-Bin had no intention of requesting additional clothing, as that would signal weakness.

Olmsworthy drew himself up and stepped forward. He didn’t expect the alien to understand his words but hoped that raised palms would be interpreted as a sign of peace. “Hello, my name is Michael Olmsworthy, secretary of the United States Air Force.”

Hak-Bin listened, made the necessary translation, and felt a rising sense of anger. He had prepared himself for a variety of possibilities, ranging from sullen resistance to fawning acceptance. This intentional insult was an unpleasant surprise. He turned to the nearest Kan officer, switched to the coarse dialect appropriate to that group, and issued an order: “Kill the one who spoke.”

The Kan raised his t-gun and fired two rocket-propelled darts. The human staggered, backpedaled, and collapsed. Blood splashed the ramp and trickled down toward the lake. The soldier felt good. His brothers would be jealous.

Windgate made a strange, inarticulate noise and threw himself forward. A second Kan fired—three projectiles this time—and the general went down.

Jina made a sobbing sound and grabbed her husband’s arm. Franklin, who fully expected to die, braced himself for the impact. Nothing happened.

“So,” Hak-Bin said in his only slightly accented English, “your insult was wasted. Two perfectly good servants are dead—and you have nothing to show for it.”

Franklin was stunned by the violence and the alien’s facility with the English language. He looked left and right. Who was the XT talking to? That’s when the politician understood the truth, realized that the alien was speaking to him, and more than that, waiting for a reply. But what to say? Something was happening here—something he had failed to grasp. Franklin performed a mental two-step and took a chance. It wasn’t something he would be proud of, not later when he reviewed it, but it probably saved their lives. “I’m sorry. It was a foolish thing to do.”

Mollified, and in need of a malleable human, Hak-Bin waved a pincer. “Your apology is accepted. We, too, have our pride.”

Franklin, who couldn’t think of anything to say, chose to remain silent. The alien seemed to expect as much and continued to speak. “It may interest you to know that we arrived in your solar system some twenty-five planetary rotations ago, and, rather than announce our presence, chose to observe your civilization instead. We monitored thousands of audio-video broadcasts, absorbed your major languages, mapped your technology, and drew some conclusions regarding your culture. You are a talkative species, much given to meaningless babble, and we are not. Please keep that in mind while I outline my proposal.”

Franklin nodded mutely, wondered if he was trapped in some horrible nightmare, and fought the desire to say something meaningless.

“My name is Hak-Bin,” the alien continued, “and I, along with my fellow Zin, rule the Sauron race. We attacked your planet for an extremely important reason. We are a nomadic people destined to roam the stars in search of a planet called Paradise. Our religion, a philosophic structure so highly evolved that you would never be able to comprehend it, requires that we construct what you might refer to as ‘temples’ along the path of our journey.”

The last statement was an out-and-out lie, but the Zin had no intention of revealing that. “Labor will be required to build these temples,” the Sauron continued, “which explains why some of your population will be allowed to live.

“However, in order to control the slaves and ensure maximum productivity, a native leader is required. Someone who understands the nature of the situation, has his people’s best interests at heart, and has the requisite experience. You are what is referred to as a ‘governor’…. Is that correct?”

“Well, yes,” Franklin began, “but I don’t understand how—”

“Of course you don’t understand,” Hak-Bin interrupted. “Inferior beings seldom do.”

The alien directed a pincer at the smaller being who stood to one side. “The Ra ‘Na have full access to the somewhat primitive computers in which your personal data are stored. They ran a search, and three thousand one hundred twelve names appeared. Many of the candidates are dead. You survived. Will you accept the position or not?”

Jina, who didn’t like what she was hearing, squeezed her husband’s arm. “Don’t do it, Alex…. They plan to make you into a slavemaster, a puppet, someone they can manipulate.”

The politician knew his wife was correct but couldn’t help himself. Here was power, or the promise of it, plus an opportunity to make an important difference. Perhaps he could negotiate improvements, help those under him, and make things better. Besides, even if he refused, someone else was sure to agree. His voice was hoarse. “Yes, I accept.”

Jina gave a gasp of surprise, the Sauron clacked his pincers, and the Fon turned toward the barge. “Excellent. We will locate suitable quarters for you and your mate. Training will be necessary. We will meet in orbit.”

So saying, the Sauron turned his back and shuffled toward the water. He had boarded the barge, and was halfway to the shuttle, when six powerful explosions shook the ground. Waves crossed the lake. Smoke boiled up into the sky. McChord AFB ceased to exist.

THE COAST OF OREGON

The secretary-general had been a field worker once and still liked to “get out and about,” as she referred to her trips to the world’s current trouble spots. So, given the fact that her security detail went where she did, Manning had seen plenty of refugees. But he had never been one himself.

People joined or dropped out from time to time as the security chief found himself walking with a group of people all of whom moved at the same pace. Among them were an older couple who wore matching parkas and seemed way too cheerful. Both were extremely fit and seemed to take pleasure in walking younger people into the ground.

Slightly to the rear, trudging head down, was a middle-aged businessman. He tried his cell phone from time to time, frowned when it didn’t work, and shook his head. He wore an overcoat, suit, tie, and tasseled loafers. They wouldn’t last very long, and Manning gave thanks for his boots.

Ahead, and a little to the right, were a mother and her two children, all dressed in puffy coats. The older of the two, a boy of seven or eight, walked, while the younger, a girl of three or four, sat in a well-equipped stroller. Manning couldn’t see the woman’s face but guessed that she was pretty.

But there were others as well, predators who watched the stream of humanity with hard, glittering eyes, sifting the flow for those who might have something worth stealing, or, as in the case of the young mother, might offer some recreation.

Manning, who was trained to scan his surroundings for signs of trouble, noticed them right away. A group of three men, all standing around the back end of a stalled pickup truck. They looked more like weekend football fans than people who feared for their lives. Perhaps that was because they didn’t get it yet, and wouldn’t until they were forced to do so, or ceased to exist.

Well aware that his pack could attract the wrong sort of attention, and hoping to avoid trouble, the security chief edged toward the other side of the highway.

The older couple made a similar move, and Manning waited for the others to do likewise. But much to his surprise, they didn’t. The businessman, who seemed oblivious to the threat, walked right past them. The predators might have interfered, might have gone for the briefcase, but the young mother was there to distract them.

The girl started to cry, so the woman didn’t immediately notice when the men sauntered out onto the two-lane highway and stood in her path. She saw them and turned to the left, but it was too late.

Their leader had long, stringy hair, two days’ worth of dirty-blond beard, and a Colt .45. It was stuck into the top of his pants. He sneered. “Hey, baby, what’s happening?”

The woman tried to go around, but Stringy Hair stepped in close, put a hand on the stroller, and said something Manning couldn’t hear. Her hand made a cracking sound as it connected with the side of his unshaven face.

The security chief did a quick 360, realized that the flow of refugees had bent out toward the ocean, and that no one planned to help. He couldn’t really blame them. The predators were armed and looked barroom mean.

Manning sighed. Here was the kind of trouble he really didn’t need. But what choice was there? Stringy Hair delivered a blow to the woman’s face, the boy tried to hit him, and the girl cried harder.

The security chief pulled the Smith & Wesson and held it down along the side of his right leg. He was no more than ten feet away when the threesome finally took notice.

The biggest, a beer belly with a 12-gauge duck gun, turned to deal with the interloper. “The bitch belongs to us—go find your own.”

Manning had a healthy respect for scatterguns and men with beer bellies. Some are soft, and fold when you hit them, while others are rock hard. He shot the big man twice. Once in the chest and once in the head. Brains flew back and spattered the pickup.

The body was still in the process of falling when the security chief nailed the second backup in the throat and turned to Stringy Hair. His eyes were big, his mouth was open, and the .45 was stuck. The would-be rapist jerked on the handle, shot himself in the thigh, and collapsed like a sack of potatoes. He screamed as he went down. The pistol skittered away. Manning bent to retrieve it. Stringy Hair curled up into the fetal position, grabbed his bloodied leg, and muttered an obscene prayer—”O Jesus, motherfucking God, O Jesus, motherfucking God …”—over and over again.

One side of the woman’s face had started to swell. The boy clung to her leg. Manning offered the .45 grip-first. She took it. He pointed. “The safety is there…. Squeeze to fire. Any questions?”

The woman shook her head. “No. Thank you.”

Manning nodded. “You’re welcome. That’s one brave little boy you have there. His father would be proud.”

The security chief remembered the other weapons and turned to find that they were gone. Scavengers had snapped them up. He shrugged, turned toward the north, and resumed his journey.

Stringy Hair was crying by then—begging for help. No one listened.

SALEM, OREGON

George Farley—Staff Sergeant Farley to those who had known him in the Rangers, and “Popcorn” to his friends—took advantage of his considerable knowledge of Salem, Oregon, pushed his ’06 Ford pickup down a series of back roads, pulled a hard right-hand turn, passed under the cedar crosspiece that Deacon Smith and he had hung a little over two years before, and churned his way up the gravel drive. Linda would be mad, what with his speeding and all, but Deac would understand. Aliens had landed, and the whole world was in the shitter.

A well-kept two-story house appeared up at the end of the drive. It was gray with white trim, and looked normal except for the fact that the ten-year-old Suburban was missing, and Ralph, Deac’s one-eyed Lab, was nowhere to be seen. Of course, Deac could be down at the store, buying some last-minute supplies, or topping the four-by-four’s dual tanks.

Farley killed the engine, opened the door, and jumped to the ground. Gravel crunched under his army-style combat boots. Had anyone been watching, they would have seen a middle-aged black man who walked with a slight limp, had the beginnings of a paunch, and wore a .44-caliber wheel gun in a custom holster. They might have underestimated Farley, might have written him off. And been very, very wrong. The ex-noncom paused in front of the house. “It’s me, Linda! George Farley.” Not mandatory, but not a bad idea—since Linda kept a 12-gauge by the front door.

But there was no reply, no sound of footsteps, and no rug-rats exploding around the corner of the house as they shouted his name and tackled his knees. What there was amounted to a single sheet of folded paper attached to a clip on the front door. Farley pulled the sheet loose and turned into the light. The words were typewritten.

Dear Friends,

Linda and I have gone to be with her parents in Ashland—and we’ll be back soon. May God bless and be with you.

Deacon Smith

Farley gave a snort of derision, restored the paper to the clip, and ran his hand over the top of the door frame. Linda’s parents were dead, they weren’t from Ashland, and the whole thing was bullshit. Everything except the blessing. That was serious.

The key was where it had always been. It slid into the lock, turned the tumblers, and, when turned another full rotation, disarmed Deac’s homemade burglar alarm—a system complete with its own standby battery in case the power failed, which it sure as hell had.

Farley entered the house, took note of the fact that it was neat as a pin, and conducted a lightning-fast tour. Looters, and they’d be along soon, would believe that the place was untouched, and, if asked, would testify to the fact. The ex-noncom knew differently.

The family photos were missing, all of them, as were all but two of Deac’s guns, neither one of which would shoot worth a damn, plus the Ranger plaque, the one that General Mosho had awarded him, which bore words taken from paragraph three of the Ranger Creed: “Never shall I fail my comrades. I will always keep myself mentally alert, physically strong, and morally straight and I will shoulder more than my share of the task, whatever it may be … Deacon Smith … a Ranger through and through.”

Also missing were the patchwork quilt Linda was so proud of, a sandalwood cross, and half the books in the living room.

Farley paused for a moment, put his hands on his hips, and shook his head. “I don’t know where it is, you sneaky bastard—but I know it’s out there. The place you never told anyone about, not even me, ’cause they can beat information out of anybody, and your family’s on the line. Good for you, Deac, good for you. I’ve got my own little hidey-hole, but I reckon you know that, and I’m gonna climb in and button things up. Vaya con Dios, old buddy, and watch your six.”

That being said, Farley hitched his gun belt up, locked the front door, and drove away. He and his wife were gone an hour later.

Elsewhere, all across the country, thousands of survivalists, nature freaks, cult members, diehard loners, and just plain wackos faded into the wild. Everyone else continued to die.

WEST OF LINCOLN CITY, OREGON

Manning was on Highway 18, headed east toward Portland, when he walked into the Sauron trap. He had traveled more than twenty-five miles during the past twenty-four hours, spent the night curled up in the back of a decrepit ’03 Dodge van, and consumed the only food he had: a single Mars bar. It left him thirsty. He should have considered food, should have bought or stolen some, but it was too late. Every store he passed had been looted and completely cleaned out. Most of the convenience stores were easy pickings, since they belonged to huge conglomerates, and the employees ran rather than defend them. Others—mom-and-pop enterprises—showed signs of violence. The facades all looked the same. Smashed glass, bullet holes, and stupid graffiti.

The security chief forced himself to inspect a couple of stores, hoping for an overlooked candy bar or a can of Coke, but the only merchandise that remained were things like floor mops, racks of magazines, and rotting produce. That and some pitiful bodies.

Manning ignored the stores after that, telling himself that Portland was the goal, while trying to ignore the rumblings in his stomach. The security chief and roughly thirty others topped a hill and approached the intersection without knowing exactly where they were. The Hertz map, the only guidance Manning had, didn’t show anything beyond major highways, towns, and landmarks.

The group of walkers had evolved by then. The older couple had continued north toward Tilamook, the businessman had last been seen trying to use a pay phone, and the woman with the two children had turned toward home.

New recruits had joined, however, and while different in many respects, all shared one common trait. They liked to walk fast, and that being the case, often overtook and passed slower “pods,” a fact that led some of the more loquacious members of the group to adopt a group name.

Manning didn’t care for that sort of thing but made no attempt to fight it, and was among the self-styled “Jets” when they topped a hill and approached an intersection. There were some tired-looking buildings, the still-smoking remains of a gas station, and a clutch of half-slagged tractor-trailer rigs.

There was no one in sight, not so much as a dog, and, if Manning had been a little less tired, he might have wondered why. But he didn’t, which meant that he was as surprised as everyone else when a hundred Kan warriors shuffled out of the surrounding structures, ordered the humans to place their hands on their heads, and marched them up a graveled side road.

Manning considered the Smith & Wesson, knew it would be suicide, and did what he was told. He eyed the guards. They were heavily armed, which meant that a good deal of their bodies was covered by straps, pouches, and other gear. They looked like huge insects and walked upright. Their skins were brown, if “skin” was the right word, and it shifted to match the background. Not perfectly—but to a significant extent. That meant the surface of their bodies looked a lot like army camos, only animated, because the effect continued to change. Born soldiers then, evolved for war, and doing what they did best.

Still, seeing the aliens made them less frightening somehow. They looked tough, no doubt about that, but far from invincible, not to his eye, anyway, which offered a small ray of hope.

There wasn’t much time for evaluation, however, as the humans were forced through a cattle gate and out into a field. Some equipment had been established near a metal water trough—and a group of small fur-covered aliens seemed to be in charge of it. They looked nothing like the warriors and were clearly part of another species.

The aliens spoke via electronic translators, ordered the captives to remove all objects from their pockets, and pointed to a large pile of belongings. It stood head-high and served as mute testimony to the fact that a number of refugees had already been processed through the trap. Manning looked back over his shoulder and realized that trees screened the field from the highway. The next pod of hikers would have no way to know what had befallen the Jets. The town, if that’s what it was, had been transformed into a simple but effective processing center.

Manning looked at the pile as he shrugged the pack off his back. He saw child carriers, purses, umbrellas, unicoms, a shovel, a camp stove, a crutch, and other items too numerous to identify. It reminded him of pictures he’d seen of the World War II Holocaust, and his spirits plummeted.

He had hoped—no, assumed—that a battle was being fought, that the human race had a chance, but here was what looked like irrefutable evidence to the contrary. To be this organized, this sure of themselves, the aliens had already won.

The others must have felt the same way. Dull eyes met his as they threw what few belongings they had onto the pile.

Manning contributed the pack, the handgun, the Hertz access device, his pocket change, and, after another moment’s thought, his Buck pocketknife. The one his father had been carrying the day a heart attack brought him down. It was a hard decision but a good one.

Shortly thereafter the entire group was poked, prodded, and pushed toward a metal framework. A line formed, jerked its way forward, and paused when a beep sounded. One of the aliens grabbed a woman by the arm, jerked her out of the file, and passed her on. Another held the human, put a t-shaped weapon to her head, and blew her brains out. She crumpled to the ground.

None of the XTs showed the slightest bit of interest in finding out what had tripped the alarm. Had the female been so foolish as to retain a weapon? Or—and Manning judged this to be more likely—had she forgotten some keys? Or a PDA? Or a ballpoint pen? No one would ever know.

A pair of aliens, white—not como-brown, like the soldiers—moved in to drag the corpse toward a prefab outbuilding. A path of bent blood-smeared grass led the way.

Manning stepped through the gate, felt a sense of relief when nothing happened, and felt something jab him in the side. A pincer? A weapon? It hardly mattered. He hurried to catch up.

The group was chivied across the field and down a slope. A sizable man-made drainage pond lay at the bottom. A shuttle, similar to the ones the security chief had seen earlier, floated on the dark gray surface.

Manning studied the ship, looking for clues that might tell him something about his captors, but didn’t learn much. The hull metal was dark gray in color, nearly black, and looked worn.

The ship’s design puzzled Manning. Why would what looked like land-based life forms build ships oriented to the water? Or could it land anywhere—and the pond had been a matter of convenience? Just one of many unanswered questions.

The humans tramped through a watering station, where they were allowed to scoop one and only one cup of reasonably clean water out of a metal trough before being herded toward the ship.

A metal ramp extended from the shuttle to the shore. It bounced as the humans made their way on board. It was warm inside, too warm from Manning’s point of view, and rather strangely proportioned. Everything seemed just a little too small, including the hatches, which forced the aliens to stoop, and the more obvious fittings.

Metal paneling lined the interior of the ship. Each rectangle was embossed with hundreds of shapes and patterns, some of which reminded the ex-geologist of the fossils found in certain kinds of sediment, only different in shape.

The cargo compartment was relatively large. It was already half filled with frightened humans and the stink of their sweat, feces, and urine. There was an almost universal moan of misery as the newcomers were ushered in and as those who had been squatting, or in some cases lying on the metal deck, were forced to stand or be trampled.

Some effort had been made to use one particular corner of the space as a makeshift toilet. Manning edged away from that, found himself jammed against a gaunt-looking mail carrier, and heard the hatch slam shut. The lights went out a few seconds later.

The cargo compartment was full, so full that no one could do anything but stand, and there was no need for safety harnesses. Each and every human would serve as padding for the rest, and if he or she died, then so what? There were plenty more to call upon.

A voice issued from the darkness. “Welcome to Bug Air.”

No one laughed.

PURDY, WASHINGTON

The Washington State Women’s Correctional Facility near Purdy hunkered low and gray. With the exception of the new four-story maximum-security block constructed in 2014, and the bulbous gray water tower, the rest of the buildings were only two or three stories tall. A cyclone fence topped with razor wire circled the perimeter. A fringe of trees sought to conceal the complex, but no amount of green camouflage could disguise the fact that even now, after decades of steadily declining crime rates, the human race still produced individuals so amoral, so dangerous, that they were best kept confined.

Marta Manning, a.k.a. “the bitch in cell 147,” was only vaguely aware of external events, but that wasn’t the prison’s fault—no, not by a long shot. Not only was the inmate population allowed to watch television, they were encouraged to do so, in the belief that a steady diet of soaps and sitcoms would help keep the lid on. But the news shows weren’t very popular, not unless something relevant was on, which meant something about them. Maybe that’s why nobody took the alien stuff very seriously until it was too late.

Marta was focused on something she considered to be a good deal more important, and, if allowed to go unchallenged, might disturb the hard-won status quo.

The inmate population had been segregated for a long time, not as a result of policies put in place by prison administrators, but by the prisoners themselves, who, led by the likes of Marta Manning, had allowed themselves to be defined by the color of their skin, divided into racially defined gangs, and set at each other’s throats.

The authorities disapproved, or said they did, although there was very little doubt that the racial divides helped keep the overall population weak, making their jobs that much easier.

That being the case, certain things were tolerated, including the way that women of the same race clustered together during meals or out in the yard. So it was obvious when someone crossed the line.

The girl named Angie had arrived two days before, and for reasons known only to herself, had chosen to associate herself with Las Chicas. Something that their leader, a tough young woman named Trena, had decided to tolerate as a way to pull Marta’s chain. An obvious offense and one that had to be addressed. Not with the other gang leader, not right away, but with Angie, because for segregation to work everyone needs to know his or her place and stick to it.

Marta watched thoughtfully as the white girl took a tray, passed through the chow line, and made her way across the cafeteria. Las Chicas made room for her; Trena waved and laughed out loud.

Marta endured the insult, turned her attention to the food, and let the sisters talk. Most were spineless sluts who didn’t actually believe in the cause, but a few were hard-core bad-to-the-bone female warriors who cared as much as she did. Women who understood that struggle is the price of survival, that competition is nature’s way, that the end justifies the means. They knew that the white race had been chosen by God and that the nonwhites, also known as “mud people,” or “muds,” were the descendants of “pre-Adamite” races created by Satan. The true-blue believers ate in silence; the rest worked their jaws.

Lunch ended forty-five minutes later and, as the population was allowed to go out into the yard, a carefully conceived plan was put into play.

Angie had never been very good at picking friends. The boy who talked her into robbing the convenience store and the woman named Trena were only the latest examples of this flaw.

As the “fish” followed Las Chicas out into the cold, Angie was blissfully unaware of the movements around her until hands grabbed her arms, bodies closed around her, and she was frog-marched toward a corner of the exercise area. A poorly conceived overhead walkway built the year before had created a tiny blind spot, or “safety,” where the inmates could have a few moments of privacy. The word “Femskin” had been painted on the wall, using the same type style favored by World War II Nazis.

The Hispanic women had disappeared, and Angie found herself surrounded by a wall of flinty-eyed white chicks. She tried to cry out, tried to call for help, but a fist slammed into her ribs. Words were transformed into inarticulate croak. Someone smelled of cheap perfume. Angie fought to breathe.

The “painters” were waiting. The feces, which had been donated by one of Marta’s most trusted lieutenants and stored in a plastic bag, were brown in color, and though slightly more dense than Marta would have preferred, adequate for the task.

Two of the sisters held Angie’s arms while two more, both equipped with disposable gloves stolen from the kitchen, went to work. Marta waited until the first gob of excrement had been smeared across Angie’s mouth before stepping in close. Her voice was deceptively quiet. “So, bitch, you want to be brown? Well, you’ll be real brown in about thirty seconds. Brown and smelly—just like the hos that hang with Trena. Is that what you want to be? One of Trena’s hos? Or maybe you’d like to spend some time with your own kind? If so, join us for dinner tonight. The choice is yours.”

Angie gagged on the smell, tried to keep her mouth closed, but was unable to do so. The recently consumed lunch came up and spewed outward.

Marta sidestepped and laughed. The rest of the group did likewise.

Angie, her face covered with feces and her chest splattered with vomit, was propelled out into the yard. The whole thing had taken less than a minute and a half.

Tears ran down Angie’s face as she stumbled, regained her balance, and made for the patch of ground that Las Chicas referred to as la casa.

But rather than the sympathy she expected, the fish was treated with contempt instead. Like Marta, Trena’s power flowed from the racial divide, and she saw no reason to give it up for some gringa. Besides, everyone knew the Femskins were not only crazy but dangerous as well. The Hispanic pointed, held her nose, and laughed.

Angie, totally friendless, and humiliated beyond belief, was trapped. Even she knew better than to go to the guards or to rat Marta out. She sensed that there were worse things than the “facials” and was determined to avoid them.

A full half hour elapsed before the inmates were allowed to leave the yard and Angie returned to her cell. A single glance in the mirror was sufficient to ascertain that her efforts to wipe the disgusting substance from her face had been futile. Patches of dried excrement still clung to her skin. She opened the tap on her small metal sink, grabbed a bar of soap, and scrubbed till her skin was raw. Then, clean at last, she collapsed on her bunk and wished she were dead.

The inmates might have spent more time discussing Angie’s predicament, and taken bets on what she would do, but that was the afternoon when the external world managed to penetrate the prison’s walls. They heard the dull thump, thump, thump as bombs hit Bremerton Naval Base, saw some of the last television feeds before the networks went off the air, and complained as raw, acrid smoke made its way into the prison’s ventilation system.

Everybody had people on the outside, even Marta Manning, and was scared for them. Those with children had it worst, desperate to know if they were okay but with no means to find out.

The staff had similar concerns and, lacking the discipline expected of military personnel, started to desert their posts.

The warden, terrified of what might happen as her people melted away, instituted a full-scale lockdown, issued weapons to the guards who remained, and wondered what to do next. Her name was Martha Anne Farraday—Miss Farraday to the staff, and ma’am to the inmates. There were rules, plenty of them, regarding everything from prisoner hygiene to the color of paint on the walls, but none that covered this. Not only that, but the phones were dead, her Internet connection was down, and there was no way to pass the buck to Olympia. Passing the buck was something Miss Farraday was known for.

She accepted a note brought by one of the remaining guards and actually read it. The message was short—and brevity was a virtue. Some of the cons made a hobby out of writing long and largely meritless missives complaining about the way they were treated, requesting special privileges, or trying to earn the kind of suck points that would influence the Parole Board. This one was different. It read: “I can help,” and it was signed by Marta Manning.

Farraday made a point out of knowing who the leaders were, out of keeping the gangs in some sort of balance, so she was well acquainted with the individual in question, knew about Angie’s “facial,” and approved of it. The prison was like a kettle of tea … the steam it produced needed a place to go. She controlled some of that steam, but so did Marta, Trena, and a couple more. Maybe, just maybe, the woman could help keep the lid on. Yes, Marta was dangerous, the fact that she had beaten a man to death attested to that, but so what? Farraday had dealt with hundreds of dangerous offenders over the years and always came out on top.

The warden sent a guard to get the inmate, turned the high-backed chair toward the window, and watched the world go up in smoke.

Marta offered Dedra and the rest of the blacks a one-fingered salute as the guard escorted her through the cell block. They shouted the usual insults, but their hearts weren’t in it. Some shit was coming down, some heavy shit, and the white bitch was small potatoes.

Marta made note of the fact that at least half the staff appeared to be missing, followed the guard through a heavily secured door, and eyed his sidearm. He wore the weapon high and tight, the way street cops do, and tilted toward the front. His name was Marvin, Marvin Pesko, and he lived by himself. That’s why he was still here, because there was no one to go home to, no one who cared.

I’ll bet you practice in front of the mirror, Marta thought, and I’ll bet you never lose. Every time that bad boy comes out of the holster, somebody has to die. Except that nobody has—and nobody will.

They entered the elevator, the doors closed, and Marta opened her blouse. Her breasts weren’t especially large, but they were firm, and plenty good enough. Especially for mooks like Marvin.

The guard looked, realized his mistake, and was reaching for his weapon when Marta kicked him in the balls. Marvin grabbed the pain, left his head open, and paid the price.

Marta had been victimized by a long string of boyfriends till one of them introduced her to kickboxing and soon lived to regret it. She took to the sport like a duck to water, kicked his ass the first night she found him with someone else, and never took shit from a man again. Including the one she killed. Marta practiced in her cell and tried to stay in shape. She put Marvin down for good.

Farraday heard the knock and said “enter,” but didn’t turn. It was a trick, one of many she used to keep the upper hand, especially where mind-gaming inmates were concerned. Body language could be a tool and her position signaled superiority mixed with disdain. The warden heard the door close, gave the inmate a moment to cross the wooden floor, and swiveled around.

Marta waited for eye contact, brought the Glock out of hiding, and held it barrel up. She was tall for a woman, about five-nine, very lean. So lean that her brother called her “stringbean,” or “SB” for short. Her hair was crew-cut short. She managed to look good in prison blues—like a model at a dude ranch. Her eyes were blue, ice blue, and disturbing somehow. They looked hard, unyielding, as if made of stone. The kind of stone on which the Kingdom of God would eventually be built. The rest of her face was attractive in a stiff, angular sort of way.

Farraday eyed the weapon. This was not the way she had planned to die. “So,” she said, “your mind is made up? There’s nothing I can say or do?”

Marta shook her head. “Nope, I don’t think so.”

“You won’t get far, you know. The aliens kill anything that moves.”

“Not everything,” Marta answered calmly. “Not the things that are stronger and meaner than they are.”

“And that’s you?” the warden asked skeptically, her hand drifting toward the .32 clipped to the underside of her desk.

The Glock jumped twice, the noise bounced off paneled walls, and casings tinkled to the floor. Farraday jerked, looked surprised, and slid to the floor. “No,” Marta said with an air of certainty, “that’s Yahweh.”

It took little more than a minute to find the .32, shove it down the back of her jeans, and grab the warden’s plain black purse. The inmate took the administrator’s key card, some money that was already worthless, and a remote with the name “Honda” embossed on it.

Marta thought about releasing some of the others, her lieutenants if no one else, but decided not to. Once free, they would want to hook up with their families, do some drugs, and generally waste time. No, it didn’t make sense. The only things she would take with her would be the pictures of her mother and her brother plus the stuff she had stolen. Everything else could stay.

Marta draped Farraday’s jacket over the Glock, marched down the hall, and left through the staff entrance. Even more of the guards had deserted by then, and she could hear the inmates yelling. No one tried to stop her. Cold air hit her face, the smoke made her cough, and something went “boom” in the distance. Rows of mature trees marched across the parking lot, their recently fallen leaves crunching underfoot.

There were at least three Hondas in the lot. The remote started the second. She got in, released the brake, and pulled out of the lot. The motor, which was electric, made a soft, whining sound. Was it evening? She wasn’t sure. Marta turned the lights on and headed for the highway. It felt good to be free.

HOWARD UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, D.C.

The attack was only hours old, and most of the television networks were still on the air when Professor Boyer Blue returned to his office, laid his lecture materials on an already cluttered wooden desk, and searched for the remote. It was hidden beneath the copy-edited manuscript for his latest book: White, Yellow, Black, and Brown: A Study in the Symbology of Race. It was due back to the publisher in three days—which meant he’d have to work all weekend.

The following moment, the one in which he lifted the remote and pressed the power button, would remain burned into his memory for the rest of his life.

Later he would wonder how such a thing was possible, how God could be so cruel, until finally, shivering under the remains of a freeway overpass, he would realize the truth: Horrible though the image was, he knew the fate of his wife and child, while thousands did not. There was a blessing in that—and a strange sort of emotional freedom. Death mattered no more.

The old outdated HDTV screen popped to life, and the shot showed a beautiful African-American woman with a child at her side. Not just any woman, but his woman, and not just any child, but his daughter.

Loretta looked poised, as she always did, like royalty, or the way royalty should look, calm, confident, and almost impossibly serene. Especially given the smoke that rose in the background, the people who ran every which way, and the persistent sound of sirens.

Snowflakes, only a few, drifted, as if exempt from the law of gravity. The school, his daughter’s school, was in the process of being evacuated. That meant they were a good twenty-five miles away—a reality he had only begun to consider. His wife was in midparagraph: “… So it makes sense to send the children home, though I’m worried about—”

Loretta never finished her sentence. There was a flash of light, the 150-year-old school seemed to leap off its foundation, and the picture snapped to black. It stayed that way until a shaken anchorwoman appeared, mumbled something about having lost the feed, and started to cry.

Blue cried, too, big, wet tears like he hadn’t cried in years. Tears for himself, for his family, for the entire human race.

Later, when he found himself huddled under the overpass, the historian couldn’t remember leaving the office, or walking in the vague direction of home. He had learned some things, however … things he should have known all along.

First was the fact that “home” wasn’t so much a place as a set of relationships, now snatched away.

Second was the fact that life is fleeting—here one moment and gone the next.

Third was that deep down in his hypothalamus, the marrow of his bones, or the twisted pairings of his DNA dwelled the very thing he studied for so long. The thing that defined who he was. Man. Black man. African-American man. An African-American hu-man. And they, the things that killed his family, were the other. The other group, the other tribe, the other race, the other color, the other religion, the other team, the other by which Blue and people like him would now come to define themselves.

A scholar named Vamik Volkan had written about the phenomenon, about the way in which people ignore their breathing until they contract pneumonia and start to notice each breath, and how people don’t concern themselves about group identity until it is threatened. And now, as the world caved in around him, Blue’s identity seemed very important indeed.

What did it mean? It meant that in spite of all his training, all the civilized notions he believed in, the academic wanted something so primal, so base, that his great-great-great-grandfather would have understood it. He wanted revenge.

NEAR THE COAST OF OREGON

The Sauron shuttle lifted off the surface of the man-made lake more by means of brute strength than by whatever lift the stubby wings were able to generate. Once aloft, the alien aircraft started to climb.

The humans, packed cheek to jowl in the shuttle’s cargo compartment, felt the additional gs, heard their ears pop, but were powerless to move. Manning was reminded of Styrofoam pellets. Only these pellets were made of flesh and blood.

Making an already uncomfortable situation worse was the fact that most if not all of the humans were from North America, a place where people value “personal space” and go to considerable lengths to establish and maintain it.

The security chief, who had spent time in other cultures, understood the problem but discovered that understanding didn’t make much difference. Soft, warm flesh pressed in from all sides and threatened to engulf him. That, combined with total darkness, was extremely claustrophobic, and Manning fought to maintain his composure.

Manning remembered his watch and how the woman had died over something equally mundane. He’d been lucky. He realized how ironic the thought was and suppressed a chuckle.

It was difficult to drag his arms up in front of his face, but the security chief managed to do so. He touched a button, saw the circle of light appear, and felt better somehow. Others weren’t so easily comforted.

Voices came out of the darkness, crying, pleading, desperate for relief. They were tolerated at first, but each voice seemed to trigger another, until those with more control started to assert themselves. They lashed out verbally, instructing the voices to “shut the hell up,” and, when that failed to elicit the desired result, inflicted punishment via their knees and elbows.

The “voices” complained, tried to move away, and, like a bowl of gelatin, sent shock waves rolling from one side of the compartment to the other.

That resulted in reprisals both against the voices and the largely innocent “transmitters” who tried to defend themselves.

Finally, after what Manning estimated to be ten or fifteen minutes of such activity, it finally wound down. The voices were reduced to an occasional sob, the enforcers let up, and peace reigned. Conversations had a tendency to die, somebody muttered the Lord’s Prayer, and another person started to snore.

Now, with nothing beyond his own thoughts to occupy his time and energy, Manning thought about Marta, felt the usual sense of guilt, and realized that he’d been wrong. She wasn’t safe. Not in prison—not outside. None of his attempts to protect to her, to guide her, had made any difference. Something, he wasn’t sure what, had gone terribly wrong during the years after their mother’s death. Years during which their father would trudge off to work, put in his eight hours, and trudge back home. His was a life of duty, of doing what “Mary would want me to do,” but empty of joy.

Marta, who had been a rambunctious little girl prior to her mother’s death, had started to wilt, to fade, until the smiles disappeared.

At some point she turned to boys, and when they failed to deliver what she was looking for, to groups of people. Scumbags for the most part—who tried to transform their largely meaningless lives by hating others. Self-proclaimed soldiers of God who dreamed of a Christian nation free of mosques and synagogues, and a culture based on Aryan values.

And it was there, in the context of hatred, that his little sister found the support she’d been looking for. A fact that came back to haunt Manning after he and his team were accused of racism after someone named him “The Butcher of Pretoria,” and his picture appeared on the World Wide Web, plastered right next to one of his sister dressed in full Nazi regalia.

That had been it, the end of the end, and he still couldn’t hate her. Only his father, for giving up, and himself for doing the same.

The transition to weightlessness came with very little warning. There was a good four feet of space between their heads and the ceiling—or what navy personnel would refer to as the “overhead.” It wasn’t long before some of the captives were squirted upward, and swore as they hit their heads on bare metal. It was natural to flail about. Boots connected with faces, victims sought revenge, and chaos prevailed. The security chief entertained the notion of trying to restore order, but only briefly, because although he saw himself as something of a leader, he had no talent for that kind of leadership, the kind that volunteered itself.

Not everyone felt that way, however, which was good not only for the prisoners, but for humanity in general. A deep bass boomed through the compartment. It was loud enough to be heard over everything else. The syntax had a military ring. “All right, people—that’ll be enough of that. Those of you who wound up as floaters need to control your movements. Go horizontal, gently now, and stay that way. Use the overhead to orient yourselves. Everyone else—as you were. You’ll have increased elbow room, so go ahead and enjoy it. Keep one thing in mind, however: The chits could activate some sort of artificial gravity system, or put us back on Earth. The floaters will fall either way. We need to be ready for that, so pay attention. The moment you feel gravity, reach up, grab some ankles, and pull ’em down. It’s that or a broken head.”

Everything the man said made perfect sense. Manning was grateful to the unseen pragmatist—and so, for the most part, was everyone else. Only one voice suggested that the pragmatist could “shove it,” but the owner took a well-aimed elbow in the ribs from the person to his right.

There was one thing the levelheaded advice couldn’t protect them from, however, and that was the fact that a significant amount of the previously static waste materials were suddenly airborne, and, thanks to the fact that at least 20 percent of the prisoners were spacesick, a fog of vomitus misted the air. Manning choked on the taste, fought the nausea that threatened to overwhelm him, and momentarily wished he were dead.

That was the moment when his inner ear signaled some sort of change, the shuttle slowed, and gravity started to return. “Now!” the pragmatist boomed. “Reach up, find some ankles, and pull them down. Quickly, before they fall on our heads!”

The security chief did as directed, located a pair of feet, and worked his way back to a pair of thick ankles. The next step proved more difficult, however, since there was nothing beyond the friction of the bodies around Manning to anchor him in place, and each attempt to pull the floater down served to lift him up.

A dramatic increase in gravity served to resolve the matter, however, and the “standers” were soon struggling to reintegrate the “floaters” into their midst, a task only barely accomplished when the shuttle touched down. It hit with a thump that was felt throughout the ship’s hull. Were they back on the surface? And if so, where? There was no way to know.

A full fifteen minutes passed before an exterior hatch finally opened and light flooded in along with a blast of cold, ozonetinged atmosphere. The humans just stood there, blinking into the glare of the cargo lights, until the alien warriors began to shout. Their translators doubled as amplifiers, and the words punched through the hard, cold air. “Out! Out! Out!”

Metal clanged, hydraulics whined somewhere nearby, and the prisoners shuffled down a ramp. It shivered under their weight. They weren’t on Earth, that was for sure, which suggested artificial gravity.

Manning saw his own breath, eyed his companions, and knew he looked as they did. Most had matted hair, filthy skin, and dirty clothes.

The environment was of even greater interest, however, and like most of those around him, the security chief turned his attention to the inside of the alien spaceship. The first thing that struck him was how large the vessel’s interior was. The hangar deck, if that’s what it could properly be called, was easily the size of Seattle’s Safeco Field. A steel deck stretched in every direction. Shuttles crouched at thirty-yard intervals, and carts whined in every direction. He could see other groups of humans in the distance. One such group appeared to be Asian. And that suggested the alien attack had been a worldwide effort.

Manning allowed his eyes to drift upward. What looked like galleries rose on three sides and were served by a fleet of small sledlike vehicles, some of which carried the insectoid aliens, although most were piloted by the small fur-covered XTs the human had noticed earlier.

The fourth bulkhead was dominated by a huge blue disk, or what appeared to be a disk, that rotated in a counterclockwise manner.

The security chief scanned the area around him. The overall impression he received was one of calm, well-organized activity—an observation that did nothing to make him feel any better.

Suddenly there was a loud “pop,” which the aliens ignored and the humans responded to. Manning looked in the direction of the noise just in time to see the blue disk complete its transformation to light turquoise. A shuttle nosed through the very center of the steadily rotating pinwheel, circled the blast-scarred deck, and settled in for a landing. Another “pop,” and the disk turned dark blue again.

Manning was a geologist by training, but it didn’t require a degree in physics to realize that the blue disk represented some sort of force field, which functioned as a semipermeable lock—a level of technological sophistication far in advance of anything humans had achieved. If the security chief had been depressed before, he was even more so now.

But there were even more immediate concerns to be dealt with, such as staying alive, which Manning was determined to do. He looked over the shoulder in front of him and realized that the line had started to split. It didn’t make any sense until he realized that people with darker skin were being separated out.

The security chief’s first reaction was to feel a sense of concern for them, until he saw the table full of refreshments, and realized that his sympathies were misplaced. Or were they? Manning looked again, confirmed the fact that no such accommodation awaited people such as himself, and wondered why.

Four of the small fur-covered aliens trotted by. They carried an elaborately carved sedan chair occupied by one of the insectoid aliens.

“Hey,” one man said, waving his arms. “What about us? We’d like some water, too.”

“Yeah,” a woman agreed stoutly. “It isn’t fair!”

One of the warrior aliens took exception to the unauthorized verbalization and laid a shock baton along the side of the woman’s head. She dropped like a rock. The complaining stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

The security chief saw a man dressed in a badly soiled army uniform, noticed the sergeant’s stripes on his sleeves, and pegged the noncom as the voice from the darkness. A no-nonsense type who might make an effective ally. There wasn’t anything he could do about the idea, not right then, but Manning made a note to follow up if the opportunity came.

With no refreshments to slow it down, the line he was in moved more quickly than the other lines did. Nothing was said—that level of hostility would come later—but some very nasty looks were directed toward those who had benefited from the alien favoritism. Never mind the fact that at least a third of the darker-skinned humans refused to partake in the refreshments on principle—and never mind the fact that many of the others would have accepted such favoritism had it been offered to them. A wedge had been driven, and North American society, or what was left of it, started to split.

The line jerked forward. One by one the humans stepped up to a long metal table. It was laden with what looked like a jumble of electronic equipment and staffed by four of the small fur-covered aliens. The security chief wondered who they were. Slaves? Or willing participants? Dominated by the bugs but feeding off their conquests? There was no way to know.

The man in front of Manning exchanged words with one of the diminutive aliens and stepped out of the way. Manning moved forward. The table, which had been designed to meet the needs of those who were using it, hit him above the knees. The voice had a hard, mechanical edge to it. The request took the human by surprise. “Social Security number, please.”

Manning looked at the equipment arrayed in front of him, realized that some of it was human, and gave the appropriate response. There was little point in doing otherwise.

The technician’s name was Da Dwa—and he hated the job to which he had been assigned. Processing sentient beings into slavery—what could be worse? And yet, shameful though the procedure was, the Ra ‘Na couldn’t help but feel proud. After all, who but his people had the technical expertise necessary to marry modern cutting-edge computers with the unsophisticated junk manufactured by the natives? Nobody, that’s who, not that the Saurons showed the least bit of appreciation.

Da Dwa entered the number verbally and touched one of the twenty-eight digit-sized depressions that lined the keyboard in front of him. The data display shivered and changed. A picture of the human appeared. It was the same one associated with his chipcard-encoded passport, his U.N. ID badge, and his international driver’s license. Biographical information pulled straight out of the United Nations’ highly secured computer system flooded the Dell XX-3D Holotank. The translation was a little ragged in places, especially where acronyms, abbreviations, and U.N.-specific jargon were concerned, but the essence was clear enough. Dwa looked almost straight up. “You were trained as a geologist?”

Manning felt completely helpless. The bastards had his personnel file! Or his resume, or his school records, or a credit report. Not that it made much difference. “Yeah, I have a master’s in geology.”

Dwa felt sorry for the human—but not as sorry as he felt for those who lacked relevant skills. They were being ejected from the ship’s locks in groups of fifteen. The Saurons saw no reason to expend the time or the energy necessary to return surplus humans to the surface. Not when there were plenty of natives running around loose.

The Ra ‘Na turned toward one of the omnipresent Kan. On any matter that was technical in nature, or required the ability to read and write, the slaves had the upper hand. The words were in Sauron. “Send him to the mines.”

Manning was shoved in the direction of a twenty-person cluster. All of them were Caucasion. The same noncom he had noticed earlier stood at the periphery of the crowd. The security chief drifted in that direction. The soldier wore a name tag that read: “Vilo Kell.” He was handsome in a rugged sort of way, with a blond crew cut, blue eyes, and square jaw. “So,” Manning said by way of an opener, “nice job aboard the shuttle. We were in need of some organization.”

The noncom looked surprised. “Thanks, but the credit belongs to someone else. I had you pegged as the man in the dark.”

Both men laughed. It seemed natural to shake hands and introduce themselves. The soldier explained that he was a member of the 2nd Battalion (Ranger), which had originally been activated at Fort Lewis, Washington, back in 1974 and was still there. He’d been in Oregon for a conference and walked into the same trap that Manning had only six hours earlier. “So,” Kell finished, “what do you make of the whole table thing?”

“Some sort of sorting process would be my guess,” Manning responded, scanning the people around them. “What does this group have in common, anyway?”

“They’re young, meaning less than fifty years old, and mostly male. Everybody’s in reasonably good shape.”

Manning nodded. “Right on every count, but I’ve got a hunch that there’s something more, a factor we can’t see.”

Kell shrugged. “You’re probably right, but it beats the heck out of me.”

The conversation ended as an alien barked a series of orders. The group formed a line and marched toward a distant corner of the deck. The security chief sensed motion off to the right and turned to look.

A brown bug had taken up a position next to the humans and carried one of the smaller aliens on his back. The well-designed saddle appeared as though it were well made and suggested that such rides were fairly common, a conclusion that raised even more questions regarding the nature of the relationship between the species. The little furry guys carried black aliens—but the brown bugs carried them. The whole thing was screwy.

The rider looked a lot like the individual who had asked Manning for his Social Security number. For some reason, he wasn’t sure why, the security chief felt a connection with the alien. He took a chance. “Hello there—what can you tell me about where we’re headed?”

Dwa considered the question and decided that there would be no harm in answering it. He liked looking down on someone for a change. “This group will be transported to an orbital asteroid, where they will work in the mines.”

An asteroid! Holy shit. There had long been talk about such things, but no one had actually accomplished it. The geology thing suddenly made sense. The bugs wanted knowledgeable miners. If given a chance to interview them, the security chief would find that he was shoulder to shoulder with a bunch of mining engineers, equipment operators, and other experts. “So,” Manning said, searching for the bright side, “how long before we come back?”

Had Manning been better acquainted with Ra ‘Na facial expressions he would have recognized the ears-forward position for what it was: an expression of surprise. “Back?” the technician asked rhetorically. “None of you will come back.” So saying, the alien urged his mount forward and made for the head of the line.

Kell, who had monitored the interchange, looked back over his shoulder. “Way to go … you really know how to lift a guy’s spirits.”

“No problem,” Manning replied. “It was the least I could do. By the way—I was a geologist once. What do the bugs want with you?”

“I’m not sure,” the Ranger replied soberly, “but it might have something to do with things that go boom.”

“You’re a demolitions expert?”

“Yup. When I’m sober.”

“So you could help me blow myself up?”

“I’m your man.”

“Thanks.”

“Think nothing of it.”

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON

The fancifully named Neptune Hotel and Entertainment Complex sat at the end of a man-made peninsula a full half mile out into Seattle’s Elliott Bay. Controversial from its inception, the project had been built by a consortium of international hoteliers on fill generated by the 6.3 quake of ’09.

Though devastated by the considerable loss of life, and more than five billion dollars’ worth of property damage, Seattle’s citizens had been determined not only to rebuild, but also to make the Emerald City bigger and better than before.

The Neptune Project had taken a negative—the collapse of the elevated highway that ran along the east side of Elliott Bay—and turned it into a positive: sufficient fill to construct an artificial island and connecting causeway.

Though it had been completed long before he had taken office, Alexander Franklin was quite familiar with the complex. In addition to having attended countless political functions there, he and his administration had inherited two lawsuits filed by enraged environmentalists. Not that their efforts had much relevance anymore.

The Sauron shuttle circled the bay, providing the politician and his wife with an only partially obstructed view of their new home. Significant parts of the city were still on fire—but the prevailing winds blew most of the smoke toward the east. The hotel, which a reporter for the Seattle Times had described as “a cross between a wedding cake and a Moorish fortress,” rose in tiers, each succeeding layer smaller than the one below. It was white, and judging from above, largely untouched. Whether that was by chance or design there was no way to know.

“It’s grotesque,” Jina whispered, “and people will hate us for living there. Especially when they have so little.”

Franklin shared his wife’s concern, even going so far as to wonder if Hak-Bin wanted the population to hate him, but with characteristic optimism, saw the issue as a challenge rather than an insurmountable barrier. He patted her arm. “It’s not as if we were given any choice, babe. Let’s see if we can open the hotel to injured children or something. That would take the edge off.”

Though more than a little cynical, the comment did represent an attempt to take her concerns into account, and Jina decided to accept the peace offering. More than that, to take her husband at his word—and the sooner the better. The shuttle touched down, threw a bow wave, and coasted toward the three-hundred-slip marina.

Elsewhere, many miles above, a Zin master sat in a thronelike chair and examined the image that rotated in front of him. The text, which only he and his peers were able to read, amounted to a biological calendar, a blueprint for the coming months, and an outline of what he was expected to accomplish—would accomplish, no matter the price. Not that he was worried. Things had gone well, very well, and there was reason to be pleased. The planet Haven was ready—and the real work could now begin.

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Framed