Ages in Oblivion Thrown: Book One of the Sleep Trilogy (6 page)

These visions, or whatever one might call
them, that was the hard part to handle. She knew it wasn’t a
genuine memory, either, a nightmarish amalgam of her past….
Frustration and terror boiled up, bringing the pain in her head to
a peak of intensity like she had not yet experienced.

Maeve leaned against a wall, gasping for
air. The smell of burning flesh hung round her; a specter of some
forgotten evil. The image was there and gone, more quickly than she
could try to remember where it had come from. It was a fragment of
a fragment, too brief to discern what was reality or falsehood. She
walked into the cargo hold, feeling like a fraction of herself. She
tried to stow her unhappiness. There was no point in telling anyone
about these visions she had been having. Not just yet, anyway.

“
So, Colonel, what do we have?” He
looked over her way, from his doubled over position next to Dick’s
inherited workstation, and as some form of answer, tapped the
monitor.

“
Come and see.” His finger held steady
on the screen, drawing her closer. She walked toward the container,
toward the nameless beast of burden that had been her home of late,
and stepped into uncertainty. Or maybe she was just being
melodramatic.

“
Interesting.” The monitor displayed
what evidently was her file. Maeve Brighid Howard, date of
birth..., place of birth..., schooling, and then, below all the
harmlessness, her military duty record. There was no gasp of
surprise on her part as she swiftly pretended to scan the data,
merely moving on to find the next person. Tark glanced her way to
gauge a reaction, but found only an expression of displeasure
shadowing her face.

“
What’s wrong?” Not for the first
time, he wished he could read her mind.

“
Let’s see the rest. Then I’ll
discuss.” She delivered those few words with a degree of terseness
Tark had heard before. Maeve looked impatient and unhappy. Dick
read the cue. He flew through his tasking to retrieve first the
rest of the files, as well as other information that had been
recovered.

They seemed to have been selected for some
sort of experiment funded by their defense department, to be
beginning test subjects for long-term space flight. Maeve remained
unconvinced. It was tidy enough, to be sure, but it didn’t sit
right with her. The untouchable place in her memories sat back and
smiled. It watched, waited, and knew. Maeve could only make
conjectures, still looking through their files, thinking her
thoughts in silence.

۞

Back on Earth during the storms, vacationers
swarmed through plentiful biological preserves, beaches, and
resorts. It was a comfortable and pleasant illusion. Holidaying
military personnel could be expected to spend a great deal of
money.

Families entertaining their bored children
were similarly counted on to mindlessly part with cash. Society’s
ills were carefully hidden and scrupulously forgotten. The poor and
homeless were pushed into tent camps, always just out of sight.
Filth and decay, closeted and painted over. It was a world that
Maeve and her friends would still recognize whenever the chance to
reacquaint themselves came.

In fact, the only people on the planet who
didn’t really enjoy the lengthy holiday were high-level
politicians, their aides, and that unpleasantly sizeable number of
impoverished persons. Somewhere in the bowels of a four-star hotel,
a certain group of individuals met. These were concerned with the
former group. It was a small though powerful gathering of men and
women.

Commander Hawke had sent her message to
them, and they were not well-pleased. At that moment, they weren’t
even lamenting their lack of holidaying, much less quality family
time. An air of grimness permeated the room, and no measure of
gourmet food and drink plied on them would appease them. A terrible
clamor had erupted within moments of their gathering.

“
I thought we had been assured that
this
problem
was long ago
resolved.” One woman spoke around an uncommon cigarette; she was
supported by more shouting from the other thirty-odd gathered
there.

“
You said it had been destroyed.
You
showed
us
evidence.”

“
What about your other promises,
Robert? Are they all worthless as well?”

“
We’re at considerable risk here. We
need assurances!”

“
Who did we send to take care of it?”
A voice broke into the chaos.

“
This is what I had always been told
about the vessel: that it had been destroyed, nearly after its
inception. Of course, there had been rumors, but nothing
substantiative.” The person speaking at that moment managed to
silence everyone with a wave of his hand, and spoke on, “However,
as we all know now, this situation that our forbears worked to
suppress, simply has…arisen.”

Robert Warden held off a new surge of
voices, and looked around him carefully, and with a deadly calm in
his voice, finished, “It, of course, means that
we
will have to eliminate the situation, with
minimal risk to ourselves. I have taken the initial action of
meting punishment to Commander Hawke. I think you’ll all agree that
the doctor’s usefulness has long since passed. Boko?” Silent accord
washed over the tense environment, as the person who had been
called upon stood and began to speak. He read from a communiqué
before proceeding.

“
Well, sir, apparently your request
regarding the commander was approved by the uh, JCS, and they have
forwarded it through the chain of command. It should reach Colonel
Tarkington’s desk in a few days.”

“
That’s what I hate about bureaucracy.
It lacks decisiveness, and the ability to destroy your enemies
quickly when you really need to.” Knowing smiles were exchanged,
and Boko spoke up again.

“
Is it really true that these people
were programmed with the expectation that they could destroy us? I
find that a bit hard to swallow.” Robert looked at the younger man,
with only a hint of fear clouding his eyes.

“Trust me Boko, that’s a myth. However, they
were chosen to participate in an
experiment
because of
certain strengths they each possess.” Not to mention a few
weaknesses, he thought with satisfaction. “We will survive, of
course, there is no other possible outcome.”

Boko shifted in his seat. The intensity of
his employer always put him on edge. He’d already begun to think
that his time in service had reached its end. A flight to Peru,
paid for in cash, reminded him that safety was only an hour away.
That reassuring thought did nothing to keep doubt from rising up in
Boko’s mind. Like bile, it would eat away at his confidence until
whatever was left peeked through.

۞

At the same time, on the other side of
the planet, two other people were readying to begin a journey for
which they had been preparing over the course of two years. They,
like the recently awakened men and women back on the
Nimitz,
had started off shakily,
unsure of their future. They had grown into their roles as well as
their mentor had known they would. He surveyed them now with no
little amount of pride, thinking of the risk he had taken to locate
them, to retrieve them, and now, to send them out alone. For their
part, the two looked forward to the mission that lay
ahead.

Watching them from a distance, observing
their interactions, Kun stayed well clear of an argument that was
brewing between them. Though these two young people worked fairly
well together, their personalities and sensibilities were quite
opposite. After several minutes of listening to them squabble, he
rapped his long walking stick on the stones underfoot. He motioned
for them to follow him from the cave outside into the compound that
they all lived in. Embarrassed, they quietly moved to their
feet.

In the depths of a valley, set in the midst
of Peruvian peaks, was their temporary home. It was quiet and
remote, peaceful; an illusion of beautiful life. It had been
tempting to forget the outside world on many occasions. Fergus
Wallace looked out over the expanse of their adopted home. Their
grass-covered huts were dug down into the soil, hidden in plain
sight. They could move freely before sunrise, and after sunset. The
rest of the time, they had to keep under the camouflage netting
that obscured them from aerial view. They grew most of their food,
but had to keep it scattered and removed from the camp. In spite of
this, Wallace had come to love the place. He had been able to start
over, leave the past behind. That would all come to an end now.

This was the crux of the argument
between him and Julieta Ramirez, his companion. Well, not
like that
, good grief. She was like
a brother to him. A mean older brother. He was trying to construct
as many objections and obstacles to their departure as possible.
Jules just wanted to get going. Creeping around in the dark was
beginning to get to her. Wallace felt compelled to remind her that
outer space was just as dark. That was the point when Master Kun
had interrupted.

“
You both know that the day has
finally come, as we knew it would, when your comrades would be
revived. Your mission is therefore initiated, and the end of our
enemies is at hand.” Julieta looked over at Wallace, eyebrow
raised. This was an unspoken dare for him to continue his
opposition to the idea with Kun. He rolled his eyes over to the
horizon high above them. Sunset was only a few minutes off. He said
nothing.

The next morning came early, unmoved by
Wallace’s prayerful pleas to keep it at bay. The two travelers
looked up onto the path by which they would travel out of the
valley. Their escort was comprised of a few goats and another of
their companions. These waited patiently, in spite of the goats’
desire to get to the sweet grasses along the trailside.

They were as ready as they could be for what
lay ahead, and yet they both felt a nagging apprehension floating
nearby. It was nothing readily identifiable. Julieta had felt this
vague thing for some time. It was like an aching joint before a
storm. She set aside any worry, however, with the anticipation of
finally getting to be up amongst the stars. Sort of. She was almost
giddy with anticipation.

Wallace was not. He was trying to avoid
calculating all the G-forces and microgravity, and certainly
avoided thought of how precisely anyone had sorted artificial
gravity. He sidestepped these questions because he knew he was
completely unqualified to answer them. His fears and nagging
worries kept trying to talk him back into it, though.

“
Jules, can I tell you something? I
mean, besides that I neglected to put on underwear today.” Julieta
sighed and rubbed her temples. These had begun to ache more and
more frequently of late, and she knew exactly who to
blame.

“
Yes, Wallace, you can tell me
almost
everything. We settled that
after the last underwear incident, remember?” He grinned at her in
that manner of his that made it impossible to be in any way serious
with him. Even Master Kun couldn’t keep a straight face when
Wallace began to pontificate.

“
I was just checking. Anyway, remember
when I was telling you about those dreams I was having, and then
you said you didn’t want to hear about that kind of....”

“
Yeah, I remember. Get on with the
point of the matter would you?”

“
Okay, take it easy. Well, since we’re
on our way, I thought we’d better discuss the whole situation.”
Julieta started to protest. “Not the dreams. Not exactly anyway.
Just the main character. The girl I used to…well you
know…Howard.”

“Is that like ‘A Boy Named Sue’?” Never let
it be said I had no sense of humor, she thought. Wallace was
grimacing. She had underestimated once again, his propensity to
have his feelings hurt at the drop of a hat. He had his sad puppy
face on. “All right, I’m sorry. Tell me.”

“
That’s her
last
name, genius. Remember?”

”
Her being who, then?”

“
Maeve.”

“
You don’t think that it’s finally
time to let go of this? We don’t even know what kind of shape she’s
in. And I’d appreciate it if you could try to…”

“
I know. You never
really
met her though, see, since you got there
after the fact, but….” She looked at him sharply.

“
I remember who she is. The question
is, how well do you? Don’t you think it’s possible you’ve idealized
her just a tiny bit?” He shifted uncomfortably under her glare. She
wondered idly, as she watched him squirm, whether he was aware of
just how much she knew. Maeve had been long gone by the time she
got to the facility, it was true. But there had been plenty of
other people to talk to and hear all the stories from.

“
It doesn’t matter. You’re right, I
don’t even know what we’ll find when we get there.” He couldn’t
look at Julieta. She’d see straight through him. Instead, he
fiddled with some loose threads on his trousers, hoping that he
wouldn’t walk off the edge of the trail, for lack of
concentration.

Or that he wouldn’t burst into flames for
being the big fat liar that he was. He tried hard to forget his
past, and sometimes he pulled it off, until night came, inevitably,
and held him prisoner. He couldn’t recall a full night of sleep in
the past two years. The ever-distant Maeve had haunted him for
almost as long, always running away, never granting him
absolution.