the night with his vision darkened by the bronze lens of his goggles, waiting to die.
The stars were dim points overhead. The buildings around him existed only as square shadows. Then his headset crackled again. “Where is Cam?” a woman asked.
“Ruth?” he said, and there was a burst of chatter from the other guards.
“How are Michael and—”
“—did you—”
“Stay off the radio!” Greg said. “Hey! Stay off the radio so she can talk!”
Cam looked across the village again. He heard more voices in the darkness now. The two men at Station Ten were arguing with each other, and Cam wondered how long they would stay put. It wasn’t even midnight.
“Ruth?” he asked, brooding over the tone of her few words. He knew her too well. Bad news, he thought. It’s bad news.
“I need to talk to you,” she said.
Cam stalked through the village without needing a light. The layout was simple, with seventeen huts set in a ring around their four greenhouses, a storage shed, the dining hall, and the showers. Nor did they own enough luxuries to scatter hazards like children’s toys or spare engine parts on the ground.
He passed through the leeside of a hut, leaving the wind. Then he moved back into the current. It rushed around his legs and through the spaces between his arms and chest, seeking any gap in his armor. Cold and hungry, it swirled against his face.
Cam was already badly spooked. The transition from that quiet instant back into the wind made him stop at the edge of another protected space. His mind roared with old gunfire and the howl of planes—the stark image of a one-eyed man lifting a shovel like an axe—the feel and smell of an emaciated young woman coughing blood into his face. He could also see Allison’s grin, though he tried to suppress that image. The memories inside him were hellish and raw and he didn’t want to pollute his favorite things about her.
He turned back into the wind with his M4 swinging beside him in one hand, leaning his weight forward as if walking through deep mud or snow. The truth was that they were already buried in another plague. They lived deep within an invisible ocean, but they had all learned to ignore it as best they could. Earth’s atmosphere was permeated by the dead. Trillions of people, animals, birds, and insects had been exploded into dust by the machine plague. Replicating without end, the archos tech used every available speck of carbon and iron to build more of itself, disintegrating untold megatons of living flesh into microscopic machines—machines that, in their own fashion, still lived on.
The archos tech would forever seek new hosts. Thousands of inert nanos covered every short yard of ground, thicker here, thinner there, like unseen membranes and drifts. With each step Cam stirred up great puffs of it. The only reason they could survive below ten thousand feet was because they’d beaten it. Their own bodies had become tiny processing stations, destroying insignificant amounts of the machine plague every day, after Ruth and her colleagues found a way to shield them.
Could she do it again?
Protect her, he thought. Protect her and maybe everything will be okay again.
Their only salvation was the vaccine nano. Originally, it had been an inefficient savior. It could be overwhelmed. In an ideal scenario it would have killed the machine plague as soon as the plague touched their skin or lungs. Realistically, its capacity to target the plague was limited and it functioned best against live, active infections. That was a problem. The plague took minutes or even hours to “wake up” after it was absorbed by a host. In that time, it could travel farther than was easily understood. Human beings were comprised of miles upon miles of veins, tissue, organs, and muscle—and once the machine plague began to replicate, the body’s own pulse became a weakness, distributing the nanotech
The stars were dim points overhead. The buildings around him existed only as square shadows. Then his headset crackled again. “Where is Cam?” a woman asked.
“Ruth?” he said, and there was a burst of chatter from the other guards.
“How are Michael and—”
“—did you—”
“Stay off the radio!” Greg said. “Hey! Stay off the radio so she can talk!”
Cam looked across the village again. He heard more voices in the darkness now. The two men at Station Ten were arguing with each other, and Cam wondered how long they would stay put. It wasn’t even midnight.
“Ruth?” he asked, brooding over the tone of her few words. He knew her too well. Bad news, he thought. It’s bad news.
“I need to talk to you,” she said.
Cam stalked through the village without needing a light. The layout was simple, with seventeen huts set in a ring around their four greenhouses, a storage shed, the dining hall, and the showers. Nor did they own enough luxuries to scatter hazards like children’s toys or spare engine parts on the ground.
He passed through the leeside of a hut, leaving the wind. Then he moved back into the current. It rushed around his legs and through the spaces between his arms and chest, seeking any gap in his armor. Cold and hungry, it swirled against his face.
Cam was already badly spooked. The transition from that quiet instant back into the wind made him stop at the edge of another protected space. His mind roared with old gunfire and the howl of planes—the stark image of a one-eyed man lifting a shovel like an axe—the feel and smell of an emaciated young woman coughing blood into his face. He could also see Allison’s grin, though he tried to suppress that image. The memories inside him were hellish and raw and he didn’t want to pollute his favorite things about her.
He turned back into the wind with his M4 swinging beside him in one hand, leaning his weight forward as if walking through deep mud or snow. The truth was that they were already buried in another plague. They lived deep within an invisible ocean, but they had all learned to ignore it as best they could. Earth’s atmosphere was permeated by the dead. Trillions of people, animals, birds, and insects had been exploded into dust by the machine plague. Replicating without end, the archos tech used every available speck of carbon and iron to build more of itself, disintegrating untold megatons of living flesh into microscopic machines—machines that, in their own fashion, still lived on.
The archos tech would forever seek new hosts. Thousands of inert nanos covered every short yard of ground, thicker here, thinner there, like unseen membranes and drifts. With each step Cam stirred up great puffs of it. The only reason they could survive below ten thousand feet was because they’d beaten it. Their own bodies had become tiny processing stations, destroying insignificant amounts of the machine plague every day, after Ruth and her colleagues found a way to shield them.
Could she do it again?
Protect her, he thought. Protect her and maybe everything will be okay again.
Their only salvation was the vaccine nano. Originally, it had been an inefficient savior. It could be overwhelmed. In an ideal scenario it would have killed the machine plague as soon as the plague touched their skin or lungs. Realistically, its capacity to target the plague was limited and it functioned best against live, active infections. That was a problem. The plague took minutes or even hours to “wake up” after it was absorbed by a host. In that time, it could travel farther than was easily understood. Human beings were comprised of miles upon miles of veins, tissue, organs, and muscle—and once the machine plague began to replicate, the body’s own pulse became a weakness, distributing the nanotech
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