Doomsday Eve by Robert Moore Williams (ebook pc reader .TXT) 📗

daze was the fact that even the memory of the experience was receding. Agony came with this recession. It seemed to him that this experience was the most important thing that had ever happened to him.

And it was going away. He watched it slide out of his memory. He felt like running wildly to try and recapture it. Which way he would run did not matter, just so he ran until he found it again. He fought the impulse to run. The experience was not out there; it could not be found if he searched the whole world for it.

It was inside him.

Nedra looked at West and started to speak, but the craggy man motioned her to silence.

"Saul on the road to Damascus," Zen muttered. "Something like this happened to Saul on the road to Damascus."

"Kurt—" Nedra said. Again the craggy man motioned her to silence. The fellow, rough mountaineer that he was, seemed to have some perception of the turmoil inside a fellow human being, and more than that, to have understanding and sympathy.

"I contacted the race mind," Zen said. "For a minute, I was in touch with the field of the race. But it's gone now," he added. Sadness and a falling voice went with the last words.

"Step in front of the scope, soldier," a gravel voice growled behind him. Turning, he saw that he was next in line. The lieutenant in charge of the first aid station had spoken to him. Seeing the eagle on Zen's helmet he hastily apologized. "I beg your pardon, sir."

"It's all right," Zen said. For an instant, as conflicting ideas competed for expression in him, he wondered who he was and why he was here. Then he remembered what had happened. Well established reaction patterns took over and he stepped into position in front of the scope. Inside the back end of the truck, a transformer hummed. Although he could not feel it, he knew that a powerful stream of radiation was passing through his body and that a count was being made of the radioactivity he had absorbed. The lieutenant studied his meters, then looked up at Zen.

"You're all right, sir." He seemed puzzled.

"Not hot, eh?"

"No, sir, you're not. Frankly, I don't understand it. Oh, you've got a little exposure, but nothing serious."

"I was in one of the old mines when the blast went off," Zen explained.

"Then that accounts for it. You were lucky as hell, sir. Next."

Catching Nedra's arm, Zen swung her in front of the scope. The experience with higher levels of consciousness had been forced out of his mind, and he was all intelligence officer.

"But I'm all right! I mean, there's nothing wrong. Are you out of your mind again?"

"Yes," Zen said. "But I've got the rank to make my decisions stick whether I'm out of my mind or not. Lieutenant, check this woman. This is an order!" Zen snapped out the words with all the precision and authority of a drill-field sergeant training recruits.

"Yes, sir," the startled medical officer said.

Ignoring Nedra's protests, Zen held her in place while the equipment was put into operation. Behind them, West watched. The faintest trace of an approving smile showed on the craggy man's face.

The lieutenant looked up from his meters. "She's all right too, sir."

"Sure of that?"

"Of course I'm sure. This counter doesn't lie!" The medical officer was indignant.

So was Nedra. The violet eyes shot sparks of anger at the colonel. Zen was unimpressed. Deep inside, he was tremendously relieved. She had come down alive! She was unharmed! This was enough to make him feel good all over. He also knew what she was. No ordinary mortal could have remained in the hot zone for the length of time she had been there and emerged unharmed. He did not mind her anger. Instead he turned to West.

"You're next!"

He did not know what response to expect from the craggy man. It might be anything. To his surprise, West smiled.

"Glad to, colonel. I was hoping I would get tested, so I would know where I stood."

Without hesitation, West stepped in front of the scope. "While I am certain I did not receive enough exposure to do any damage, still it is best to follow your example and make certain." The deep voice was suave, with tiny overtones of amusement in it somewhere.

Again the lieutenant studied his meters and again he looked up. Real perplexity was on his face. "Three okays in a row. I didn't have a single okay up until now." His gaze went up the slope in the direction where the bomb had exploded.

"Does that mean I'm all right?" West asked.

"Yes. Definitely all right," the lieutenant answered. "And I don't pretend to understand it."

"I was in a hole, too," West said. He seemed to be amused at some joke known only to him.

The lieutenant brightened. "Then I understand it."

"I wish I did," Zen said, to himself. There was no longer any doubt in his mind that Nedra was one of the new people. As to West, the man was an enigma. Not knowing how long West had been exposed to the radiation, Zen did not know what to make of his freedom from it. But there was certainly something peculiar about him.

"Colonel, it was good to meet you." West was coming toward him with outstretched hand. Zen had the impression that the man's hand could turn into a veritable bear trap, if West chose. "Perhaps we shall meet again, sir." The words were a statement, not a question. An enigmatical smile played over the craggy man's face.

"Who knows whether we shall meet again?" Zen answered, shrugging. "Generally, when people say goodbye these days, they mean goodbye forever."

"I know." Sadness showed on the craggy, lined face. "It is too bad that things have to be this way. Well, experience is a difficult school, but homo sapiens seems incapable of learning in any other."

"It is war," Zen said.

"I disagree with you there," West said. "War is only a symptom of the disease, it is only an expression of humanity. War itself is not at fault, but man. Nor can man really be regarded as being at fault, since what he is now going through is only a stage of growth."

Momentarily the memory of the contact with the race mind flicked through Zen's consciousness. "I know that," he said. Then he hesitated. "Or I knew it once."

"Ah? When?"

"Up the slope there, I knew it. But I have forgotten now what I knew." Zen spoke slowly. He was trying hard to remember—or to forget—he wasn't sure which.

"Ah?" West repeated. "Goodday, sir. Nedra, I would like to speak with you for a moment, before I leave. With your permission, of course, Colonel Zen."

"Certainly," Zen said. He watched the nurse and the craggy man move up the trail a few steps. They carried on a conversation in tones too low for him to overhear, then parted. West went down to the bottom of the ravine and crossed to the other side of the gulch, where he began to climb the opposite slope, staying as far away from the radioactive zone as possible. Nedra returned to Zen beside the truck.

"Does he live back there?" the intelligence agent asked.

"I really don't know," the nurse answered. "I think he does, but I'm not certain."

"It's rough country to live in."

"From what I have seen of him, he seems capable of living almost anywhere."

"Do you know him well?"

The violet eyes regarded him thoughtfully. "You are asking a great many questions, sir."

"I'm going to ask more."

"My telephone number, no doubt. I'm sorry, but I don't have a telephone." The violet eyes grew pensive. "But if I did have a telephone number, there is no one I would rather give it to than you."

He felt a warm glow at her words. The dream that he had once shared with millions of other men, of a wife and kids, came into his mind again, a yearning that was as old as history. If he had his free choice, he would go with this dream.

He knew he did not have a free choice. Indeed, he doubted if he had any choice at all. Nor had any other man. History had moved past the day when this dream could be realized. Fate was sweeping it into the dust heap of good things that were gone forever.

V

"She is immune to radiation!" Zen thought after Nedra had left to rejoin her unit. This in itself was of sufficient importance to attract and hold the interest of the top military and scientific minds. Perhaps soldiers could also be immunized. Perhaps, by some impossible freak of chance, a way might be found for workers to return to abandoned factories, to long-closed shops and forges. This might mean a new flow of goods and materials to troops that were desperately short of them and to a civilian population that, at a conservative estimate, was more than half starved.

A human being who had achieved immunity to radiation was important enough to command his complete attention. Also, the probability was very great that she was one of the mysterious new people. Something else about her interested him even more. He could not put his finger on this something else but he suspected it had to do with the future, with another world than the one he knew. Or with another universe. Again the memory of his contact with the race mind flicked through his consciousness.

Now he knew what he was going to do insofar as Nedra was concerned. He had a hunch what her next move would be. He would wait for her to make it.

Finding a carbine was not difficult. On this trail, the weapons were to be had for picking them up. A dead man's ammunition pouches were filled with cartridges. He took the pouches. Carrying the carbine, he slid down the bank toward the mountain stream that talked to itself at the bottom of the canyon. The water was clear and cool but dead trout floating in it warned him not to drink.

Seeking a place from which he could watch the canyon, he moved upward. A dim trail was visible through the pines here.

"An old narrow-gauge railroad," he thought. The rails had been removed long since, the ties had rotted away, and the roadbed itself was hardly a trail through the growth of trees. He had barely settled himself in a spot from which to watch the ravine below, than a stone turned on the old roadbed.

Nedra was coming along the trail.

He let her pass without challenge. Sliding out of hiding, he followed her.

Twisting and turning, the trail climbed slowly upward. When it reached the edge of the timber, Zen caught a glimpse of a slide of yellow rock far ahead, an old mine dump, which told him why the road had been constructed in the first place. A ghost town was probably ahead.

He caught a glimpse of Nedra moving steadily ahead along the old road bed.

"If she doesn't know exactly where she is going, then I'm missing my guess," he thought, as he followed her. Elation was rising in him. She was leading him straight to the hiding place of the new people.

Here in these mountains a small group could remain in hiding forever. Food might eventually become a problem, but there was plenty of game in the ranges: deer, elk, and bear, and some of the high valleys had been in cultivation before the war. A few hardy pioneers had always managed to find a living in this wilderness. If they could do it, so could this new group.

Of course, they would have to evade Cuso's roving patrols, raiding for food, supplies and women. But that ought not to be too difficult. The ghost town was in sight.

Surrounding an old mine, a crusher, and a concentrator, the ghost town was also in ruins. Unlike so many small cities, the ruin here had not come from attack but from nature. The snows of winter had piled their burden on flimsy roofs, the seepage of spring had rotted the timbers, with the result that many of the houses had simply collapsed. Weeds grew in the doorways and scrub cedars had found roots in the streets.

Nedra was walking down the middle of what had once been the main street. Her stride was still certain and she seemed to know exactly where she was going.

The ragged man appeared in the door of the garage on her left. He spoke to the nurse, calling to her. She jumped at the sound of the voice, glanced at the man, then continued walking.

"Hey, wait a minute, cutie!" the fellow shouted, loud enough for Zen to hear him. He lunged out of the doorway toward her. She turned to face him.

Kurt Zen lifted the carbine, then dropped the muzzle. He not