Point Apocalypse
Authors: Alex Bobl
Alex Bobl
Point Apocalypse
a novel
Alex Bobl
Point Apocalypse
Published by Sky Bridge Publishers
, 2013
Copyright © Alex Bobl
2013
Cover Art ©
Vladimir Manyukhin 2013
English translation copyright © Irene
Woodhead 2013
Editor: Neil P. Mayhew
All Rights Reserved
This book is entirely a work of fiction. Any correlation with real people or events is coincidental.
Also by Alex Bobl:
Memoria. A Corporation of Lies
(an Action-Packed Techno Thriller)
"Hardcore action from start to finish"
"
A well polished gritty dystopian novel"
"Interesting, spooky, i
ntense"
"Reminds me of
Blade Runner
"
Chapter Five. The Trigger Code
Chapter Seven. Comrades in Misery
Chapter Eight. King of the Forest
Chapter Two. God Loves the Infantry
Chapter Four. Walking Around the Devil's Barn
Chapter Five. Long Time No See
Chapter Seven. The Tables Turn
Chapter One. The Dream Is One Step Away
Chapter Three. An Important Link
Chapter Four. As the Crow Flies
Chapter Five. Point Apocalypse
Prison World
Chapter One
The Jumpgate
D
arkness. Light. Hundreds of bare feet slapping the tiled floor around me. Pitch dark again. Blinding light - I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment but kept moving amid the naked figures. Cold water jets pelted us from the walls; people yelped, someone slipped and fell flat on the floor.
"No huddling together! Keep moving!" the invisible loudspeakers barked
in Russian. "Form columns! Line up, I said!"
The controller just had to be new. Trying too hard, the idiot. I'd love to know who'd authorized his access.
The stench of bleach hit my nose.
"Move it!" the voice hollered. "Don't stop, keep walking! Listen and obey orders!"
They dimmed the light. Strings of lamps flickered and blinked under the ceiling. Someone cussed to my right. The guy in front of me jerked back and somebody else pushed him onto me. I fended him off with my elbow, hitting his shoulder. More swearing drowned out the jets' hissing.
"Everyone shut up!" the speakers barked. "The culprits will-
"
The speakers crackled and screeched. The lights flickered and went out. The shower stopped, too. For a few seconds, the crowd continued in the dark, their bare feet slapping on the tiles.
"Serves him right, the asshole," said a voice behind me.
I didn't know whether he meant the controller who'd
loudspeakered us around or whoever had tried to start the fight.
"Hey, what is it?" a voice said. "I'm afraid of the dark."
"Get your filthy hands off me!" another voice demanded. "And keep 'em to yourself!"
"You better watch yours!"
"You what?"
What followed sounded like a slap in someone's face and a suppressed yell followed by a
struggle. Far behind my back, I heard more angry voices. I raised my fists, pressed my elbows to my sides and lowered my head. The tribunal had decided to have my acceleratory implants removed so it was time I learned to make do without them. As long as they didn't knock me off my feet, I had a fair chance of fighting them off provided I had enough space.
The crowd poured towa
rd the walls like overflowing jelly. I kept walking, all the while sensing there was no one left in front of me. The speakers were dead. The corridor filled with noises and voices.
When was the controller going to switch to the auxiliary power? There had to be a good hundred people at the jumpgate. What were they waiting for? If they didn't do it soon, people could panic causing a stampede. And I couldn't hurry the things up for fear of triggering it.
I threw my arm to one side and swiped a face whispering, "Out of my way!" I was about to add a kick but reconsidered: I might miss and fall flat on the tiles.
The
glow of lamps snaking down the corridor imprinted themselves on my retinas. I kept walking, slowly. Now I had no one left at my sides, either - only some wheezing at a safe distance behind me.
Then the lights went
back on. The water jets hit the crowd with a hum and sent people flying to the center of the corridor. I jumped over a slumped figure and escaped someone's crooked fingers digging into my shoulder. A burly man with a beard raised his fist and stepped in my way. I thumped his solar plexus.
The shower stopped.
"Everybody freeze!" the speakers howled. "Stay where you are!"
I lowered my hands and glanced over my shoulder. Behind me, two
Asians stopped in their tracks back-to-back. Could be Chinese, or... you could never tell. They all looked the same to me. Could be clones for all I knew.
"Form three ranks," this was a different
Russian voice, cold and emotionless. Apparently, a more experienced officer had replaced the hollering greenhorn. "In ten seconds I'll turn on the shower. Those failing to comply will be eliminated. Ten, nine..."
He wasn't joking. We were at the Fo
rt Commander's complete mercy. They could kill us whenever they pleased, then dump our bodies from the cliffs into the ocean to save the energy costs on the return transfer. His threat worked: we were still convicts with fewer rights than slaves, so people started getting back onto their feet and falling in. The bearded guy I'd knocked down grunted and tried to prop himself up with his elbows but failed. He pushed with his forehead against the floor.
"Seven, six..." the speakers kept on.
I grabbed the man's elbow and jerked him upright.
"Four, three... Leave the corridor once the disinfection is complete. Wait for orders to enter the airlock then proceed to the mind check. Start moving from your right, in single file."
The bearded man doubled up with his hand pressed to his stomach and teetered. I squeezed his elbow making sure he didn't collapse under the water jet.
"The shower's on - now."
I raised my face to the ceiling and closed my eyes. The cold torrent stank of chemicals as it lashed against my body.
The first cleaning cycle was followed by thirty seconds of warm disinfecting foam. They turned it off and then put the water back on, the pressure slightly less this time. Having washed off the foam, the drying systems kicked in, turning the air in t
he corridor as hot as a sauna. The sterilization lamps on the ceiling lit up, and I held my breath watching the red light flicker over the exit.
I ended up in the right column with only two men in front of me. That was good. I'd be through with the mind check quick enough.
A siren wailed announcing the end of the disinfection. The red light over the exit went out and the main lights came back on. At the end of the corridor, a steel door whirred as it sunk into the wall exposing the airlock.
The men stirred, their voices low.
"By the right, in single file!" the speakers spewed.
A tall old man happened to be the first by the airlock door. He started for it, stopped and gave a cautious look over his shoulder.
"By the right, in single file, toward the door, forward march!" repeated the voice from the ceiling.
"Get on with it, granddad," a square man from the second
rank nudged. "Don't hold everybody up."
His bulging back and arm muscles were pockmarked with what looked like bullet holes, skin tight and wrinkled around them. Only these were no bullet wounds. They'd removed enhancing implants from his shoulder muscles. The modified man must have been a heavy laborer - most likely a pit worker at one of the Arctic mines. The mines and the Army - two places you had no business to be
in Russia without muscle enhancers.
"Next," the voice echoed down the corridor once the first convict had cleared the airlock.
The miner stepped into the opening, swaying. Judging by his lack of coordination, he must have suffered the removal surgery pretty recently. I could see he hadn't adjusted to it yet. I knew by myself the first few days were the hardest.
"Next."
As I crossed the airlock, my head span around. My spine and shoulder blades started prickling in places where I'd once had my combat modules installed. The invisible rays of electromagnetic detectors searched every inch of my body, then switched off. The prickling ceased. I walked past the guardhouse to my left behind a one-way mirror and stepped into a narrow portal facing the door to the mind check room where the miner had just entered.
"Nex-" the controller didn't finish the word.
An alarm wailed. I stepped aside and looked back. The Asian who'd followed me still had a few more paces to clear the airlock. He ran, then stumbled, dropping to his knees and grasping at his blackened chest. His mouth opened, his screams inaudible above the howling of the alarm, fire and blood splattering through a hole in his chest.
The controller blocked the camera and turned off the alarm. For a few seconds, I stood still by the closed door. Then I shook my head and squatted down.
The jumpgate seemed to be rife with emergency situations. Something was going on. First the power failure in the disinfection corridor, then they'd replaced the controller, and now this Asian with his implant...
I tried to second-guess the actions of the duty
officers. Handling this kind of emergency couldn't take more than a couple of minutes at a top security facility like this one. They'd now remove the body, make a radio announcement and resume the scan.
The dead man had to be Chinese, by the looks of it. They just couldn't hel
p pushing their luck. Their wetware people were still beyond competition; so apparently, they had fixed their man with a micro container housing the implant. They must have delivered it to the carrier after the trial but before his transfer to the Fort. It looked as if they wanted to try and see if they could get a modified man through to Pangea.
Again, I shook my head. Impossible. Once the judgment was made, they removed all neuromodules and stimulators while still on Earth. After convicts were convoyed to the Kola Peninsula, they were checked again - and for all I knew, their medical staff were quite unpurchasable.