Renia cleared her throat and smiled.
“Esteemed guardians of the free world, we are honored by your presence.”
El Verdugo leaned back, retrieving a small notebook. Three-Mile unequipped his armored glove and fiddled with a PDA.
“Skip the intro,” El Verdugo commanded. His voice did not sound like it came from a 98-year-old—it sounded like a combat AI interface. The certainty of torture upon failure was embedded in every syllable. 04’s left hand shook; her smile vanished.
“…Please accept our latest scientific breakthroughs. I present to you, junior biotechnologist Dr. Eva Zharova.”
04 stepped forward and plugged her flash drive into the holo-projector. On the left of the slide stood a yellow-barked tree with thick green leaves, beside a soldier clad in power armor giving a double thumbs-up amidst gray-black, ashen earth. A 20 mm autocannon rested on the tree for scale. On the right slide, a close-up of a deep purple apple appeared next to a ruler, with the same apple on an electronic scale below—375 grams.
Three lines of purple Times New Roman text ran beneath the apple:
- Three dates = enough calories for a day of combat.
- Requires no resources; extreme radiation resistance >7 Sv.
- Seeds can be dispersed by aircraft or modified 155 mm artillery shells.
“Food wins wars. I have synthesized a way to feed our armies; behold Ziziphus Neojuba—ready for cultivation at your command, my General.” She bowed deeply and scanned the room for reactions…
…and flicked to the final slide: her tiny lab team—four humans and herself—smiling over a meal of oversized purple apples.
An Air Force brigadier general nodded and raised his glass; the only Navy officer, a rear admiral, chuckled. His face was red from the wine. His shoulders shook as he started laughing.
“Bet you can also chuck ’em at commies…” He mocked a pitching motion.
“Or brew some rum… for our non-existent Navy,” a major general whispered to the much younger Air Force officer next to him.
Soon everyone was laughing except 04, Vasquez, and Newland; they just took notes.
“Eva, Zharova, right?” The room instantly fell silent the moment Vasquez spoke. His eyes were on her; she did not sense a threat.
“Yes, my General.” She returned the gaze with the warmest smile she could conjure.
“Research and production costs.” Flatly.
“One million dollars and…” Renia interrupted.
“…Negligible production costs, sir.” Vasquez scribed in his notebook, eyes still on her.
“Toxicity?”
“Soil-dependent. Irradiated dates are bright yellow—gene warrior consumption only; dull purple—safe for human consumption.”
Acutely carcinogenic when cultivated in high-salinity soil at pH 4.
Vasquez’s gaze shifted to Renia; she nodded.
“Impressive work. Koval, verify safety, then proceed to mass production.” He scribed an O.K. 04 exhaled; the tension from her stomach evaporated.
Renia bowed deep; 04 stepped back and removed her flash drive from the holo.
See if you can find my little gift… vermin. A wisp of a smile crawled across 04’s face as she regarded Renia Koval.
“Looks like we’ll be having neo-dates for Thanksgiving…” The rear admiral was drunk again; the rest chuckled.
No thanks needed.
“Zharova!” His eyes were on her again as she looked at the gene warriors still standing at attention below them.
Yelena Zharova proudly took a step forward.
“Not you! …Name your prize.”
“My General, success and service to the free world are more than enough.”
Silence.
A pencil pointed at her face.
“You are too kind, sir. I would like to ask for a week of rest for me and my team… a week of no surveillance and no responsibilities, my General.”
“Three days. Make them count, synth.”
Of course I will. She bowed again and stepped next to Renia, not Zharova.
El Verdugo leaned close to Three-Mile and whispered something; he shielded his mouth with his palm. 04 could not read his lips. The brass talked silently, but the noise accumulated; the room gained the ambiance of a cafeteria.
Renia inched closer, yanked her hand; she barely registered the pull.
“Not bad for a bedwarmer,” Renia whispered in her ear.
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“Come join us tonight, dear,” 04 whispered back.
Renia froze; 04 closed the distance.
“Or let us arrange something more private…” 04’s fingers brushed Renia’s hand. Renia jerked back, as if stung, her breath catching, and staggered a step.
Pathetic evolutionary dead end.
Moments passed. Zharova read her notes, though she had practiced that presentation all day; her hands still trembled. Koval stole a glance at 04 and bit her lip. 04’s eyes were fixed on her armed siblings below, hands pressed against the armored glass.
“On to our main breakthrough!” Renia extended her arms.
“The great equalizer, General Vasquez, esteemed guests, I give you Professor Yelena Zharova!” She clapped.
Zharova’s holographic slides erupted into view at full brightness, every detail crisp and magnified. Nothing she ever did was half-measure. The Brass leaned forward, captivated. From the edge, 04 observed, noting the faint tremor in Zharova’s fingers. The room thrummed with tension. El Verdugo’s pencil tapped against the map in rapid, precise bursts; Three-Mile’s fingers drummed lightly on the PDA.
“Bastions of the free world, I thank you for liberating me from the tyranny of communism!” It was not her regular croaky, wheezing voice; it was as if her younger, unstoppable self had momentarily resurrected.
She skipped the first ten slides—Introduction and Materials and Methods—with a quick tap on the laser pointer. A purple PowerPoint slide blazed in the dark room, left margin:
Results
Gen-3M Gene soldiers
- Resistance >12 Sv
- IQ 170–190
- Halflife: 2 years
- Unit cost: $150,000
- Synthesis time: 12–14 hours
- Training time: 1 week (standard)
Right margin: a single picture of a gray-skinned man and a woman with coal-black hair, blood-red eyes. They were equipped with the same gear as the gene warriors standing at attention on the other side of the armored glass. They stood at attention; a rusty steel wall was the background.
Renia took the microphone in her hands and looked at the gene warriors below.
Gene soldiers. You can’t even identify them properly. 04 palmed her face.
“Gene soldiers! Whom do you serve!”
Feet slammed on steel.
“The free world! From synthesis until death!” One voice.
The… free world. 04 smirked at the irony.
Everyone stood up.
“Soldiers, lock and load. Engage targets at will.” Renia pressed a button; LCD monitors covering the arena from all angles came to life.
Then another. Humanoid steel targets popped from cutouts around the arena.
Instantly, they took cover and opened fire. Multiple cameras on the ceiling tracked hits, gave a score, and calculated reaction time and accuracy in real time. Each of them instantly knew their sector of fire; reloads never overlapped. They fired the .50 BMG as efficiently as a human would fire a 7.62×51.
Zharova gestured two fingers; Renia nodded; 04 held her breath.
Six turrets appeared around the arena.
“Contacts! Twelve!” the female sniper screamed. She trained her 20 mm rifle on the farthest turret. One depleted uranium shell obliterated it, punching a fist-sized hole in the opposite wall. She dove behind prefabricated steel cover, racked the bolt, and a smoking brass casing spun across the floor.
Full-auto gunfire.
A male gene soldier caught a bullet in the right elbow as he peeked from cover.
An explosion of gore. Blood sprayed on the armored glass; ricocheting rounds straddled it.
His arm flew back, snatching on a nearby barbed wire, still twitching. Screaming with his teeth clenched, He pulled his sidearm and peeked again engaging a new target.
Two turrets left.
The sniper peeked again, blew one to smithereens in a single shot, dashed to her wounded mate as autocannon rounds blew holes in the floor around her. She yanked the tourniquet from his rig and fastened it tight below the shoulder. He shook from the pain.
“I am here, Jesh! You got this, soldier!”
Her bloody hands on his face—he was still in shock. She injected him with morphine.
The last turret stopped, its barrel glowing yellow. A monitor flashed:
—Turret 5 Critical Malfunction—
“Walrus squad, status! Check ammo!” Her voice echoed in the killzone. She dropped her mag and slammed a new one home.
“Norton O.K., four mags!” Her mate’s hand took hers; in the next second, he also loaded a new mag, barrel still smoking, glowing red-hot.
“Konrad O.K., three mags! Get a grip! None dies today, asshole!” She leapt over a tripwire and slid next to Jesh. Then she put a cigarette in his mouth and lit it; she combed his hair.
The sniper pulled the .50 BMG mags from Jesh’s rig and shared them with her squad.
“Relocate to that corner! One point of contact entry! That’s the killzone! Semi-auto only! None fuckin’ dies today!”
“Walrus!” She raised a gloved fist in the air.
“Hurrah!” in unison.
Konrad helped Jesh on his feet, and they relocated. Bipods deployed; overlapping fields of fire set; frag grenades on their side; wire straightened. Two battle-rifle armed in front, their commander further back next to her wounded comrade.
El Verdugo got up.
Silence.
He walked toward Renia; he moved like death. She staggered a step back.
“My General! They exceeded the parameters you specified!” she gasped.
He snatched the remote control from her shaking hands.
Options > NBC agents > Sarin gas > Enter
He turned a dial; the large vents groaned to life.
A biohazard symbol came alive.
NBC: Sarin
Air concentration: 0.5 ppm
“Let’s see if you will be staying with us, Professor.” No change in his voice.
Zharova put both of her hands on the Nobel Prize and grasped it hard, whispering something.
The executioner racked up the dial.
Air concentration: 1 ppm
“Gas! Gas! Gas!” The sniper held her breath, ripped her sleeve, soaked it with water, then tied it around her mouth and nose. She doused her entire body with water and tucked as much exposed skin as she could into her uniform. Her squad followed the example.
Air concentration: 3 ppm
Her fingers began to spasm and dance against the cold steel of her rifle—a rhythmic, involuntary twitch.
Air concentration: 6 ppm
She got up, stumbled, and crawled; half of her muscles were spasming uncontrollably. Half was more than enough.
She hugged Norton, ripped the mask from her face, then his.
“Vance… good,” he wheezed.
Their mouths met as their synthetic lives were ending.
Air concentration: 12 ppm
Their entire bodies shook; their mouths foamed.
She screamed, “Walrus,” held his hand.
None begged, none cried, none showed fear, none broke rank.
The executioner shut the dial and pushed the emergency purge button.
The ventilation screamed at full force.
Hands grasped tighter.
Tears.
Pain.
Air concentration: 5 ppm
Silence.
Air concentration: 0 ppm
Hope. Spasms.
El Verdugo clenched his ancient fist, his eyes locked, unblinking, on the soldiers.
04 pressed both palms on the armored glass.
A species worth dying for.
Seconds passed.
Vance got up, coughed, still shaking. Tried to pull Norton to his feet, stumbled, and fell.
Rose again; the word Walrus echoed on carbon steel.
She pulled Norton to his feet; fingers intertwined.
They stumbled to their squad, checked their pulse.
Dead.
They saluted, picked them up, and staggered to their predetermined spots.
“Orders!” she coughed and wheezed.
He picked up the microphone.
“Name and rank.”
“Corporal Vance Van der Berg! Your command is my fate, General!”
“Private Norton O’Malley! Awaiting orders!”
“Bury your comrades. R&R for a week, Sergeant Van der Berg and Corporal O’Malley.”
El Verdugo saluted.
Everyone saluted.
They marched in lockstep to the door.
“Zharova, begin mass production. I’ll have a new battalion by the end of the week, an army group in two months.”
“Dismissed.”
He threw the remote controller on the ground, turned on the spot, and headed for the door.
I saw your free world—time for you to see mine.