Fire, Ruin, and Fury (Embers Saga) Read online

  “Minister,” Calden continued, “I’d like to introduce you to Tatiana Trapinksi, Senior Advisor for Production with the International Energy Consortium.”

  Minister Goodwell raised an eyebrow in learning his guests were from the IEC.

  “Colonel Yuan Shikai, Chief Security Administrator, on loan to us from Xin Provinces. And this is Ali Ibn al-Rashid, Special Liaison from the Pan-Islamic Caliphate.”

  “Very pleased to meet you all,” answered Alias’ father, extending his hand to each in turn while trying to suppress his suspicions of the petroleros. Minister Goodwell glanced at his son with a “what-am-I-in-for-now” expression, but he neglected to introduce Alias, as he often did.

  “I have traveled much of the world, Mister Goodwell,” offered Rashid, in near-perfect English, and with the relaxed confidence of person of some importance. “I have sat through many sermons along the way. You bring uncommon passion. May I ask how long your ministry plans to be in town? We would like opportunity to talk more about matters of some importance with you.”

  “Thank you very much for your kind words, Mr.—Rashid?” Minister Goodwell replied. “We expect to be here for three days,” he added, “assuming we are not run off by the local authorities before then.”

  Well played, Alias thought of his father, knowing the ministry hoped to stay two weeks. Whatever these guys want, they’ll prob’ly keep the thugs off our back. Alias was unaccustomed to his father being so shrewd.

  Trapinksi interrupted with a thick Russian accent, “I think we might be able to help with the local authorities.”

  “We can indeed,” added Calden.

  “Well, we would thank you kindly for that,” Minister Goodwell smiled. “Now, what is it you would like to discuss?”

  The petroleros convinced Alias’ father to sit down with them to talk more, offering to buy him dinner at the only half-way decent restaurant in the area—uncomfortably attached to a local saloon and brothel. Alias decided to follow along, introduced and invited or not. His father couldn’t be counted on to be shrewd for any length of time, and with Alias’ mother nowhere to be seen, Alias thought it prudent to follow along. Plus, Alias figured there would be a good meal thrown in.

  Minutes later, huddling in one of the restaurant’s booths, drinks in front of them, the petroleros tried to explain their situation. While scarcity of work and the ever-present threat of destitution was usually more than enough to keep workers in check, the Consortium’s Fossil Fuels Division was struggling with its people.

  Workers dragged-down output because of absenteeism—usually from drinking or drugs. After-hours fighting landed many workers—including key, skilled personnel—in detention. There was even fighting between workers on the job sites, presumably between rival gang members trying to get a monopoly on the jobs or drug trade.

  “Methylhol has become the scourge of the Desert Plains Territory,” Shikai said in an almost unintelligible Xin accent.

  No shit, Alias grumbled to himself, mindful of the common suspicion that the Ellies and the Consortiums were in knee-deep with criminal syndicates and warlords in shifting pharmas and narcotics all over the world.

  The petroleros went on to bemoan sabotage by laborers secretly working for competitors or sympathetic to the eco-terrorists committed to destroying the industry. Bombs going off inside perimeter gates. Rockets hitting vulnerable assets—with increasing precision—damaging or destroying chemical stores, exhaust systems, and equipment. Even the occasional killing of middle managers.

  Of course, they noted, the world’s unquenchable thirst for energy mandated that they repair all the damage, every time.

  To say nothing of the Consortium's limitless lust for money.

  “That gets expensive,” Calden inserted.

  “And not just the repairs,” Shikai added. “Twenty corporate security officers have been killed in just the past month. Seventy-two aerial drones, two dragon-fire attack jets, and a bull-shark jump-jets have been brought down by sophisticated—and illegal—weapons.”

  And who traffics in these weapons?

  The Consortium’s police had taken corporal punishment as far as it could, but some in leadership—especially Rashid and Shikai—felt the “kinetic approach” was doing as much harm as good. The company police’s periodic “pacification” of work sites—semi-controlled melees with riot-control squads fighting restive workers—had also failed to improve output. Aerial tear gassing of worker shantytowns, a popular Ellie method for tamping down unrest throughout the Commonwealth, bred longer-term resentment and often incited more violence against Consortium interests. Informants among the workforce helped them target beatings against the more highly-skilled problematic employees—the ones too valuable to dump—but it rarely rehabilitated them. The late-night arrests and forcible deportation of labor agitators was like fighting a hydra.

  So, the petroleros were interested in a new approach. “Something to encourage stability,” Calden professed.

  AKA, profitability, Alias translated to himself.

  They wanted to get at the deeper roots of their problem, Rashid explained. They wanted to provide the workforce with a more reliable “moral compass.”

  You’ve got to be kidding me, Alias quipped silently.

  The petroleros and Alias paused for a moment, staring at Minister Goodwell, waiting for the penny to drop. But the minister was a practiced active listener, so the silence was awkward for a moment, until Trapinksi nudged Calden to continue with more specificity.

  “The Big Five churches,” Calden explained, “have been less than effective in helping us push a common message. Some have even said that helping the Consortium would drive away their parishioners.”

  They’re prob’ly right, mused Alias No church could credibly channel the word of God if it’s under the jack-boot of the Ellies. …Though I’m surprised no one jumped on a deal for money. Weird, though, since the Ellie families are enmeshed with both the Consortiums and the clergies of the Big Five. Alias had always thought of them as a monolith.

  Calden continued, “And some leaders of the Big Five are part of the prob—”

  Rashid cleared his throat, cutting off Calden and shooting a glare at the functionary, who retreated sheepishly.

  Trapinksi interjected to deflect attention. “Most of the smaller churches are—how you say—too messianic. We don’t need end-of-the-worlders.”

  Shikai wore a serious expression on his face. “We looked other faiths too. Islam because is spreading fast in Asia and Latin America. But we know that would trigger backlash with Catholics and evangelicals here.”

  A hundred-years of war’ll do that, I s’pose, Alias thought. The dirty bombs emptying Palo Alto, Manhattan, Washington D.C., and Hollywood—not to mentioned Jerusalem—didn’t help. And the oil embargoes. The water-jihads and diaspora rebellions in Europe kinda leave a branding problem.

  “So, we are considering a new approach to a faith-based project,” Rashid finally added, hoping Minister Goodwell was ready to engage.

  Tiring of the wait as his father processed, Alias decided to move things along. “So, you need a religious leader. Someone capable—with experience dealing with the hardships of the badlands. But not a revolutionary.”

  The petroleros turned to Alias, surprised by the interjection. Rashid smiled approvingly at him. Alias looked at his father, who put a hand on Alias’ forearm and gave him a wink. It was his father’s way of retaining the lead and signaling to Alias to be more cautious. Minister Goodwell had done it a hundred times before, and the gesture always left Alias in a funk. Alias knew his father was right—the petroleros were not to be messed with; but sitting in awkward silence couldn’t be the answer either. Nevertheless, Alias took the message and sat back in his chair, his lips zipped.

  So, this Calden guy’s been scouting us, Alias thought. Makes sense they’d want us for this. Our message is good. Our presentation is better. They must assume dad wants more for the family and that he needs resources for
that. …Maybe dad’s God is finally giving him the break he needs to provide for his family and followers. Expand the church. Spread the Word. Help his flock.

  To Alias’ satisfaction, his father asked Rashid for more information, but then noted how late it was and explained that he was too tired to continue. Minister Goodwell agreed to meet again when the petroleros offered to send an airship the next morning to bring him to the Consortium’s regional headquarters outside Park City in the Southern Rocky Mountains Territory. Alias was thrilled when Rashid next extended the invitation directly to him, perhaps realizing that the young man would be an asset to the petroleros in the coming discussions.

  Minister Goodwell didn’t speak a word in the Consortium’s autocar on the ride back to the tent complex. Alias was more or less accustomed to his father’s quiet and his sometimes-maddening spells of deep thought. In this case, though, Alias really wanted to engage. There was too much at stake for his father to figure it out alone in his head or rely on the advice of his band of well-meaning misfit ministers. If his father wouldn’t talk to him about it, then Alias would ensure that his mother was in the loop.

  Unfortunately, Alias’ mother Camila and sister Jasmine were asleep when they finally made it back to the church camp. “See you in a few hours,” Alias whispered to his father in the darkness, trying to convey his determination to accept Rashid’s offer.

  You’re gonna have to expressly forbid me from coming, and either way, me and mom are gonna be part of the discussions to come.

  “OK, Junior. Get some rest,” his father replied sleepily.

  Alias’ wrist-plat alarm sounded just before dawn the next morning. He could hear his father milling around in the kitchen along with Alias’ mother and sister. With a surge of energy, Alias got dressed and was ready to go in minutes. When he entered the kitchenette, he found them all groggily chewing their breakfast of drought-oat biscuits and biotein jam. His mother and sister looked exhausted—too tired to even explore what was going on—until two Consortium jump-jets rumbled overhead in the darkness. Alias watched from the window as the lumbering giants landed in a clearing just outside the compound. Two small autocars rolled out of the bellies and zipped toward his family’s camper.

  Alias’ father hoisted a large duffle bag over his shoulder. Catching Alias’ inquisitive look, he explained, “we prob’ly won’t get back until tomorrow.”

  You still don’t know everything, Alias perceived his father saying.

  “Don’t worry,” Minister Goodwell continued, “I packed your things while you were asleep.”

  Alias deflated, his haughty demands for independence and his occasional disdain for his father again outmatched by his father’s experience—and kindness. “Thanks Dad,” he muttered begrudgingly.

  The Consortium’s security guards rapped on the door, suited head-to-toe in dust-coveralls. The leader announced a need to hurry, as a haboob had formed a few miles away, and they wanted to be airborne and gone before it arrived. They guards passed around plasticky coveralls for the family and helped them put on the suits. The leader then lowered a helmet over Alias’ head, connected a small air hose from a hand generator, and flicked a button to make the neck cushions inside inflate and tighten.

  Fancy, Alias thought to himself. Only the military and the Ellies took such sophisticated precautions in the rare instances they found themselves in a duster. Badlanders like Alias and his family just bundled-up and strapped-on small face-masks, invariably with just enough filter to scramble to the nearest shelter. Too long outside in a duster, and the filter would clog. Or the flying silicon and stone would abrade a person’s flesh. It was always just better to hunker down inside, but in this suit, Alias wondered if he could stand straight up through a whole duster.

  The guards led them to the autocars outside, which sped them to the waiting airships. The dust had already started to fly, and the ships’ engines kicked up sand and small stones, which clicked and scraped against his helmet. Alias immediately lost any curiosity of weathering the storm in the suit.

  If we’re not in the air in two minutes, we won’t get in the air at all, he worried.

  The Consortium’s air crew, seasoned with this kind of work, set to fastening-in their passengers. They speedily made their final flight prep, deployed their defensive aerial drones, and rocketed upward. Alias peered out the jet’s windows to take in his first-ever view from the sky. He had never imagined the sight of the flat expanse, now a cast in a soft purple blending at the horizon with the dark haze of the coming sand storm. The pre-dawn clouds in the east glowed pink and fiery-orange as the fathomless night sky waned. The silvery stars glinted their final defiance to the coming sun, while the moon began to fade from glowing gold to deathly white.

  Like a person stepping outside for the first time after a long illness, Alias saw Heaven in every color and twist of the landscape. Even the expanse of wasteland, stretching out in all directions, and the onslaught of airborne earth crashing over it, struck Alias as a manifestation of God. He freed his stare to look at his father, who was equally transfixed by the sight. Alias had never felt closer to his father and his father’s life’s work.

  Chapter 2: The Road to the MAC

  (Victoria Lancaster)

  Victoria Lancaster awoke on the hay-covered floor of the boxcar as dawn’s first light streamed through the seams in its plank-wood walls. A haze of dust and stench hung on the chilly air, and her first waking breath triggered a gagging cough. After a moment of disorientation, she rubbed her eyes, looking around for her family and scanning the lumps of sleeping passengers and the few gaunt faces awake in the car. It was another moment before she realized her mother was still asleep beside her. Her brother Paul sat silently against the opposite wall, staring blankly at the ceiling. He caught her gaze and offered her a tired “good-morning” smile. She was eager to avoid waking her mother, so she quietly shuffled though the dry hay to sit beside her brother.

  “How’s your head?” she whispered, gently touching the bandage that she had wrapped around his wound the night before.

  “It’ll be fine,” he whispered back. “Don’t worry about me, Victoria.”

  She stretched her neck to peer out the boxcar door to the rail station platform. Shielding her eyes from the rays of the rising sun, she could make out movement, the start of the day’s chaotic bustle. Adrenaline starting to surge through her veins, she took her brother’s hand. He answered with a reassuring squeeze.

  How can he give reassurance after what’s already happened? she wondered to herself. I guess it’s hard to imagine it getting worse.

  It had only been two days since Victoria and her family left the Consortium’s mobile shanty-town in the coastal foothills California-Sur Province. Life on the coast was blazing hot, fearful, and thirsty. There was never enough water, it seemed, and the frequent superstorms sent massive waves over the breakwaters. The surf relentlessly chipped away at the ghostly settlements, time and again forcing the headstrong population to retreat.

  Everything she had ever known was owned and operated by the International Energy Consortium—at least until it started de-scoping operations, retreating from the see-saw battles with the indomitable ocean. When the last of the oil drills finally gave way to a hurricane, and the Consortium refused to rebuild the failing port, Victoria’s father was thrown out of work—seemingly for good this time. The feeder businesses shuttered their doors, falling like so many dominos. Even her mother’s nursing job at the refinery’s infirmary succumbed. The Consortium closed its charity schools, casting thousands more children into the already-swollen streets. The food doles were cut, and rolling blackouts made the jerry-rigged desalinators fail.

  The family passed the idle nighttime hours in their tiny mobile home, which was like an oven from sunup to sundown. Her parents’ fighting had reached intolerable heights, so she found herself spending the long, hot days and most evenings with her brother and a pod of other restless unemployed young adults in the shade of ruined
highway overpasses and waterless flood-control tunnels. They fought the boredom of the interminable, sweltering days as best they could, playing cards, gossiping, telling each other stories, and having as much sex as the heat would allow.

  On more than one occasion, both she and her brother were tempted to delve deeper into the shadows of the tunnels to find some relief. To the places where some of their pod went to escape the malaise through methylhol or the other pharmas that washed over the restless population. It was only the phantom of their father’s ruined state—and their tether to one another—that kept them in the realm of conscious suffering.

  Victoria knew something had to change, as life became palpably worse each day—worse than it’d ever been, now that both her father Kahleb and mother Nessa were out of work with thousands of others. She felt the collective sense that this was more than a temporary lay off. Knowing her mother, something dramatic was in the offing.

  The upheaval came late one night, when she and her brother returned home from a day in the tunnels to find her mother and father fighting again. Paul simply rolled his eyes as he led the way past the kitchenette, where the argument was unfolding. But Victoria took notice of the argument, which curiously alternated between raised voices and hushed whispers, and she paused behind the doorway to listen.

  They were arguing over leaving California-Sur. Her father wanted to stay put—maybe trading in his mechanical repair vocation for a life on the sea. But the Pacific Collapse had closed the fisheries, and the government had declared the sparse seafood stocks to be poison, unfit for human consumption.

  “There’s no future here,” Nessa insisted.

  Nessa and Kahleb briefly looked south, but they dared not move any closer to the border with the Meso-American Republic. The dangers outweighed any job prospects in the desiccated and lawless swath that stretched from the provincial militia outpost at Pendleton to San Diego. The Commonwealth’s Domestic Security Service defense forces offered no jobs that offset the risks of living in the cartel-controlled shanties. It considered its migrant-policing and riot-squelching operations to be its primary contributions to the region, and it showed little sympathy for the poor, migrating herds transiting the sandy, sun-scorched region.