Survival Gene. Science Fiction Novel
Lorenzetti continued to run in place. Some doors and gold yellow statues flashed past. Then there was a turn, and the hacker entered a small hall lit by sunrays. A rose garden was seen behind the glass doors. One more turn, and the hacker rushed along a lighted corridor to the western wing of the White House.
Having penetrated into the closed doors, Lorenzetti went down the stairs and stopped before the door with the inscription “Situation Room”. In a second, he entered.
“Sit down, please,” CHENG Wenming pronounced loudly.
Andrew jerked at the words, but those words were not addressed to the hacker, of course.
The central part of the room was occupied by a long table. Men and women standing along it began to sit into armchairs. The President of the United States of the World, a short lean man, sat down in the far end of the table.
Lorenzetti went around the table and, folding his arms on his chest, stopped behind the President of the World.
Barkov knew by sight almost all the people who were in the room as they had often spoken on e-vision. There was the Secret Service Director Radomir Novak and several ministers – of transport, construction, communication, public health, agriculture… Obviously, the whole ruling top had gathered there.
“I’ve invited you to listen to the report from the professor of physics, the president of the International Academy of Science Sam Goodman,” CHENG Wenming said. “Sam, please!”
A gray-haired man wearing a light gray suit sitting to the right of the President stood up unhurriedly and surveyed all those present with a heavy look. Then he looked at the control panel installed in front of him on the table for the laser e-vision.
“I can see two scenarios,” he said in the distinct voice of a professional teacher. “Bad and very bad. Which one to start with?”
“With the bad one,” CHENG Wenming said.
“Okay. Now I’m going to show you the Earth.” Over the middle of the table, an image of a globe appeared and started rotating slowly. “The Earth is a sphere, isn’t it?”
“Certainly,” the Minister of Health, a dark-haired woman of about forty answered.
“The answer is incorrect!” Goodman retorted. “A sphere is a perfectly round geometrical object in three-dimensional space.”
“Are we having a geometry lesson?” the minister inquired.
A snicker spread over the room.
“I’m just reminding you of the ABCs from the school curriculum so you can understand the problem properly,” the professor objected. “And the problem is that the Earth is not perfectly round. It is flattened on its poles!” He made a gesture, and the image compressed vertically a little. “Waters of the World Ocean are retained on the equator thanks to the planet’s rotation. Now, as the rotation is slowing down, their outflow to the poles has started. For instance, the Canadian Arctic Islands have submerged almost entirely. The bad scenario is as follows: in a couple of weeks the Earth’s rotation will decelerate a few times. All the territories to the north of 50 degrees will be flooded.”
“It can’t be true!” the Minister of Agriculture, a bald-headed man with a light golden moustache resembling an ear of wheat, said.
“Yes, it can. Now you’ll see the flood.” Arrows denoting movement of waters of the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans appeared on the globe and areas in the north and south were painted over with the blue color gradually. “Most parts of Canada and Russia, the whole of England, Norway, Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, and half of Germany will submerge. But that’s not all! The atmosphere, just like the oceans, will be displaced to the upper and lower parts of the planet. Life on the equator will be impossible. The atmospheric pressure will become less on the ground level in future than it’s at the altitude of twenty kilometers now. At such pressure, the whole body will simply boil up.”
“What do you mean by ‘boiling up’? ” The Minister of Health looked puzzled.
The professor pointed with his finger at a stoppered bottle of mineral water standing on the table.
“Open the bottle, and you’ll see bubbles foaming the water. If you happen to be on the equator in two weeks, the same thing will happen to you: the gas dissolved in blood and lymph will start to ooze. It’s certain death. In the tropics – for example, in Rio de Janeiro – such things won’t happen, because you’ll die of suffocation there first. The same applies to Singapore and Bangkok. Air in those cities will be too thin to support life.”
“It’s a real nightmare!” someone’s muffled voice was heard.
“Yes, it is! Now look at the zones where life will be possible.”
Two greenish stripes appeared on the globe – in the northern and southern hemisphere.
The professor commented, “Those are spaces between the latitude of 30 and 50 degrees North and South. Air will be accumulated in the southern part of Australia, Africa and South America; in the northern hemisphere, we would be able to breathe in some parts of the USA, France and China. But there, a new problem will arise – increased solar radiation. The magnetosphere created as a result of the rotation of the Earth still protects us against destructive rays. As soon as the rotation slows down, the magnetic field will decrease. Sunrays will be deadly. People bent on suicide won’t have to jump from a cliff – it would be enough to sunbathe for ten minutes on a beach. Besides, there will be earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and thunderstorms all over the planet. However, life will be possible in the latitudes mentioned before. We call them ‘green zones’.”
“So, we must start building camps for refugees!” exclaimed the Minister of Agriculture, an elderly man with a hatchet face and dark shadows beneath his eyes resembling bruises.
Instead of the professor, a reply was given by Radomir Novak, the Director of the Secret Service, who was a big and strong man looking like a weightlifter. “Three camps are already being built.”
The Minister of Agriculture looked at him in surprise. “Really? Why don’t I know anything about it?”
“Those are secret projects, former underground military bases. We’ve started their re-equipment for the members of the World Government and their families, the management of corporations and the international police.”
“What about other people?”
“We’d been waiting for the final conclusions of the Academy before deciding how many bases we need for the rest,” the President of the World interjected, “after which we could declare total evacuation.”
The minister looked confused. “I see. Sorry for the interruption!”
So, people were not forgotten, Barkov thought. The President is really going to save everybody, just as he promised in his speech.
“I’ll continue with your permission,” Sam Goodman said, casting a cold glance at the minister. “In case of a very bad scenario, the underground military bases will be useless. They might be destroyed during earthquakes. We will need absolutely autonomous, airtight constructions on the surface. Just like those that were designed for the colonization of Mars because conditions on the Earth will not be much better.”
“You didn’t tell me about this before,” the President of the World said. He scowled at this news, then asked, “Can you substantiate your conclusions?”
The professor paused and cleared his throat. “We’ve got some geophysical evidence that the Earth’s core might stop completely. Day and night will last for half a year each, and deadly cold will alternate with unbearable heat. For instance, the temperature might go down to as low as minus one hundred Celsius at night and rise to plus eighty by day! But the worst thing is as follows: The magnetic field will be so weak that solar radiation will start to annihilate air. The Earth atmosphere will be useless for breathing and, with time, it will disappear completely.”
A few people moaned quietly.
“When will it happen?” someone asked.
“It’s hard to say. Maybe in a few hundred years… or maybe in a few months. We’re still gathering data and the dynamics are changing.”
Andrew Barkov felt a shiver down his spine. He looked at Emily Housman beside him. She looked at him, too, her eyes wide open.
“It’s a damn narrow squeak,” she whispered.
She looked at him with worry etched across her brow, her delicate lips trembling. She’s lovely, he thought, then chastised himself for thinking of anything but the current crisis.
Trying to calm down not her as much as himself, he replied, “That’s just an assumption. A tiny probability.”
“What is the probability of the planet stopping completely?” the President of the World asked, as if hearing him.
The professor paused again and uttered distinctly, “The probability is very high. That’s all I can say at the moment.”
He sat down knitting his long gray eyebrows.
Silence reigned. All eyes were turned to the President of the World. At last, CHENG Wenming said, “We must get ready for both scenarios. It is necessary to build both the camps and autonomous constructions. Radomir, do you have projects of such constructions for Mars that we can convert to use on Earth?”
“Yes and no,” the head of the Secret Service replied. “The habitats built for Mars aren’t suitable here. But we have a construction like that for Earth. Its codename is ‘Noah’s House’.”
“An analogy for ‘Noah’s Ark’?”
“Exactly. I call it ‘The Base’, for short.”
“How many people can we put up in such Noah’s Houses?”
“Two thousand people. But only in one House. It’s been built for a long time near Salt Lake City. We can’t build anymore.”
“But the population is more than twenty billion!”
Radomir Novak spread his arms. “There aren’t sufficient resources for the rest. We didn’t know that such Houses would be required so fast. We started construction before anyone knew about the asteroid.”
“Why did you start building? And why was I not informed about it?”
“We didn’t consider it to be important. At first, only private assets were used. The new owner of ‘Apple’ was the initiator. He was afraid of a flood because of global warming. Two months ago, the Security Council decided that the state had to take part in the construction – for any emergency. We improved the project by requiring that the Base be able to move not only by water, but also on the ground and even by air.”
The President was silent for a while. He took a pen and started to twirl it. At last, he spoke to everybody. “First, the right for living in Noah’s House should be granted to most talented and healthy representatives of mankind, not just businessmen and government members. Second, we must decide on what information should be provided to the mass media. Shall we declare both variants – the green zone and Noah’s House – or just the first one?”
Ministers dropped their eyes. The Director of the Secret Service answered, “We can’t possibly tell the whole truth by any means! Otherwise, each person will try to get into the safest place – the Base. It will be the war of everybody against everybody. As a result, no one will survive.”
The ministers kept silent.
“In this case,” the President of the World said gloomily, “I have to make the most difficult decision in my life. We will declare evacuation to the green zones… and pray for them to be really green. If the worst case scenario happens, at least two thousand people will survive in the airtight base. Let’s vote.”
One by one, all the ministers raised their hands.
“Unanimously,” the President of the World summed up. “In half an hour, I will give an address to the people of the Earth.”
“I’d advise to do it in two hours,” the Director of the Secret Service said. “I must put all our security forces on full alert.”
“Why?”
“I think the opposition will try to revolt. Especially separatists in the green zones. They might shout about strangers who will drive the local population out, take away their homes and food. They’ve been looking for a reason to restore borders between nations for a long time. In America, Europe, Asia…”
“I see. You’ll have one hour, no more.”
Suddenly a man with colorless eyes and white eyebrows wearing the uniform of a police sergeant appeared in the room. Barkov did not understand where he had come from. It seemed the man had walked through the wall. All the others present in the room froze as if someone pushed a pause button. A perfect silence fell on the room.
The sergeant stopped in front of Lorenzetti and said, “Mister, what are you doing here?”
Lippo stepped back. “That’s impossible!”
“What is impossible?” the sergeant asked.
“Computer!” the hacker cried out. “Break all external connections! Quickly!”
The table, chairs and people, including the sergeant, disappeared. Lorenzetti was standing alone in the middle of his white room. He had a confused and scared look, his face almost as white as the wall.
As Lorenzetti stood silent, Andrew Barkov turned to look at Emily. He understood now that Emily was right. Appearing on the e-vision, the President hadn’t told the whole truth. In fact, he told lies. He was going to continue lying, even if he meant well. Mother was right, too. Neither she nor Andrew would be able to get into the secret asylum – the so-called Noah’s House. If the Earth stopped rotating completely, one could survive only in there. It meant they were both in mortal danger. Cold, heat, radiation, lack of air… Genetic modification could be their only chance of survival.
I must act decisively and quickly. Before it’s too late.
“How did they trace me?” Lorenzetti squealed.
That was the least of Andrew’s worries. He caught Emily’s hand, stood up and towed her to the doors.
“Stop!” Lippo shouted. “Where are you going? Take me with you! I can’t stay here. They’ll come for me soon. I don’t wanna go to jail!”
“In that case, our ways part here,” Barkov replied. “Jail is the place we are going to right now.”
Chapter 9
Walking to the elevator, Andrew looked out a window.
The ocean kept receding. Since he and Emily had entered the hacker’s study, the shoreline had moved about two hundred meters further to the horizon.
The professor said that water is moving to the poles. It’s hard to imagine what’s going on in the northern territories.
The elevator doors opened. Letting the girl enter, Barkov followed her and turned back.
Lorenzetti was standing in the doorway of his study staring into space.
“Farewell,” Andrew said.
Lorenzetti seemed to pay no heed to it, his eyes glassy. Barkov pressed the “Down’ button. The doors closed and the elevator started moving.
The box slid out of the wall. The female voice announced, “Thank you for your visit. You may take your weapon.”
Taking the pistol, Andrew checked to be sure the cartridges were in place, and shoved the pistol back into the holster.
“Do you have a plan how to release my father?” Emily asked.
Andrew knew now that what Emily had told him about the Earth’s crisis had been true. Now he had to fulfill his promise to help her release her father; besides, her father would be valuable if they had any chance of survival. He knew that Eddy Housman was in the pretrial prison built a few years before in what used to be a parking lot in the center of Miami.
“Yes, I have a plan. First, I’ll enter the prison.”
“Do you have a permit?”
“No, but I’ve been there many times. I know the location.”
“Will you try to get my father by force?”
Andrew imagined Captain Palmer. He would knock out the captain with pleasure by hitting his chin with a good blow with right fist. But what to do to the others? To those Andrew had been working with all these years? They had helped him more than once in times of need – some of them by saying kind words, others by covering him with fire.
I can’t hurt those people.
“No. There must be another way.”
“What then?”
Andrew didn’t have a solution. He needed some time to think it over.
Suddenly he felt a chill in his feet. The feeling strengthened quickly. Shivers ran up his legs, spine, neck… In his mind’s eye, the picture flashed up: a dozen cops were standing before the elevator doors, weapons at the ready. The safety was released, forefingers touching the trigger…
Barkov grabbed his holster, but pulled his arm away at once. I will not shoot at my colleagues.
The elevator stopped and the doors moved apart.
“Don’t move!” one of the police shouted. “Hands up!”
Emily uttered a loud scream and jerked up both hands. Andrew froze looking over the policemen. He knew three of them: two worked in headquarters, one in the southwest department. Captain Palmer showed himself from behind a policeman’s back.
Barkov was glad to see him again – the second time in his life.
“Captain, it’s me! Order them to lower their guns!”
“I can decide myself what to order, lieutenant,” Palmer replied. “Come out over the elevator. You are under arrest!”
Guess it was too early to be glad.
“What for?”
“We’ve got orders from above. I’ve always known you can’t be trusted! Where’s the third terrorist?”
Barkov guessed the problem. The White House Secret Service technologies had proved to be much more sophisticated than Lorenzetti had believed. The virtual sergeant saw not only the hacker who was inside the 3D image, but also the detached onlookers.
“We’re not the terrorists! And there are only two of us,” Andrew answered.
“Come out of the elevator!” the policeman standing before Palmer ordered.
Barkov had never been in the position of a criminal before. The feeling was very unpleasant.
Maybe it’s all for the best. According to protocol, they must take us to the pretrial prison. I’ll be able to find Housman there.
“I can close the doors, and we’ll return to the penthouse,” Emily whispered.
“No,” Andrew answered in a quiet voice.
He raised his hands slowly and stepped out of the elevator.
“Turn around!” the same cop commanded.
Barkov turned round.
The cop ran up to him, put Andrew’s hands behind his back, and slapped on electronic bracelets that clenched automatically. Then he pulled Andrew’s pistol out of the holster.
“Now you, lady! Come out of the elevator!”
Emily fulfilled his order without uttering a word. The policeman put handcuffs on her wrists, too.
“Guys, listen to me,” Andrew said. “We are not terrorists. We just know too much. In two hours, the President of the World will be on e-vision and announce evacuation to green zones. But what he will not say that it’ll be impossible to survive even in the green zones if the earth stops rotating completely. I have an idea how we can save our lives!”
“Stop talking crap!” Captain Palmer snapped out. “You were going to blow up this building, confess to it!”
“What?”
“You’ve had your eye on my position all these years. So you decided creating a fake terrorist attack that would get me ousted, proving I couldn’t prevent crimes in my area!”
“Captain, you are paranoiac. Consult a doctor!”
Palmer came up to Andrew. Having checked if the bracelets held Barkov’s wrists tightly, he took the arrestee by his shoulders and turned him round. Andrew saw that the captain’s face twitched with emotion.
“At last, I can do what I’ve been dreaming of for so long!”
“What’s that?” Barkov inquired, knowing the answer already, his senses showing action and reaction.
The captain clenched his fist and threw his arm upward aiming at Andrew’s chin. Barkov moved aside letting the fist fly past him, and struck the captain’s groin with his shin. Palmer moaned, clutched his groin and folded up.
At the very same second Andrew realized that had been unwise. He shouldn’t have resisted. On the contrary, he should have feigned fear and dejection. And even to gratify Palmer’s wish – let him strike him once. In the pretrial prison, meek inmates were allowed to the common canteen and gym where he could see Housman!
Too late, his mistake caused blows to rain on him from all quarters. Andrew tried to evade the most dangerous of them. The cops knocked him down, kicking his back, stomach and head. Green spots danced in his eyes.
“Stop it!” Emily screamed. “You’ll kill him!”
The blows stopped and two of the cops hurried into the elevator, ready to retrieve the third terrorist.
“Captain, the elevator won’t go,” a policeman said. “It requires us to deposit our weapons!”
Palmer replied, “Don’t deposit anything! Six of you, climb the stairs, penetrate through the roof, the sewage system, whatever, and get the third member of the gang for me! Meanwhile, we’ll take these two to the prison. Detectives, take them to the car!”
Cops grasped Andrew’s arms and led him and Emily across the foyer to the exit. The concierge and the couple sitting in armchairs followed them with frightened eyes.
Before the building, there was a long line of police cars. The prisoners were put into a van with long, narrow slit-like windows. Palmer and one of sergeants Andrew didn’t know sat down on opposite seats.
Barkov came to his senses fairly quickly. His whole body was aching, but fortunately, there were neither fractures nor displacements.
“Don’t even think of escaping,” the captain warned as he took out his pistol and put it on his hip, the barrel towards Andrew. “I am ordered to bring you in dead or alive. And I’ll do it, have no doubts!”
Police alarm signals started howling. The van set out accompanied by several other cars. The columns in the form of sea horses and the flowerbed with the condominium name passed by.
Barkov made one more attempt to explain the situation. “Captain, a global disaster awaits us. You must not stay in Miami. You and your family must…”
“Shut up!” Palmer shouted, raising his gun. “If you say one more word, I’ll shoot a hole in your bean!”
This man had never been particularly bright. All he knew to do was execution of higher-ups’ orders, and he required the same thing from his subordinates. Fool. So much the worse for you.
Turning to Crandon Boulevard, the convoy of vehicles moved faster. In about three minutes, the Biscayne Key island disappeared behind them as the cars entered the bridge to Virginia Key.
Water had left the Biscayne Bay almost completely. Now it was an uneven field covered with dark green algae. Only in some points of the field were there small blue backwaters.
“They want to shoot you,” she looked directly at Palmer, “and to question us,” Emily said suddenly as she took her eyes off the window and looked at the captain.
Palmer stared at her for some time in silence. Finally, he reacted, “What are you babbling on about?”
She turned her head to Barkov and re-stated, “They want to kill them,” her eyes shifted quickly to Palmer and back to Andrew, “and to interrogate us.”
Her voice sounded even, but there was extreme tension in it.
“Where’s the information coming from?” Andrew asked, remembering the girl’s ability to hear electromagnetic waves.
“From above.”
“What do you mean by ‘above’?”
“We must run away,” she looked at Palmer again. “Stop the car now!”
Captain’s eyes widened. “What? We are sitting with guns in our hands and you are in handcuffs. Why are you trying to give me orders?”
“Ah yes, handcuffs!” the girl mumbled, as if changing her mind.
Barkov felt that the bracelets on his wrists suddenly slackened. He could cast them off. Not yet. He needed to pick the right moment.
The drone of a motor was heard from the ocean on the east side of the bridge. The sound increased quickly. In a few moments, it was clear that a helicopter was approaching.
Barkov tipped his head to one side trying to see the aircraft in the sky. The window was too narrow. He just managed to spot a formless shadow sweep past on the asphalt. The roar of the rotors made the seat vibrate for a few seconds. A bit later, the van braked abruptly.
Pressing a button on a transmitter fastened to his shoulder, Palmer said in irritation, “Why have we stopped?”
“Captain, the way is blocked,” came the answer. “A helicopter is landing.”
“Damn! It must be the higher-ups. Sergeant, watch the prisoners.”
Palmer opened the door. Putting his head out, he looked around and jumped out of the van. The cop who stayed in the van took his weapon out of his holster and put it on his hip – just the way the captain had done before.