Anvil Gate by Karen Traviss

Author:Karen Traviss
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science Fiction, video game, sci-fi
ISBN: 9781841497396
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2010-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 12

In order to preserve our existing stocks while we find a new source of imulsion, only vehicles, vessels, generators, and machinery capable of using alternative fuels will be operated until further notice. All nonessential travel and non-mains power use is now restricted to vehicles and devices rechargeable from the hydroelectric supply. This ban will be enforced under the terms of the Fortification Act. Please cooperate fully with requests from COG personnel.

(EMERGENCY ORDER FROM CHAIRMAN RICHARD PRESCOTT TO ALL VECTES INHABITANTS)

NEW JACINTO, VECTES THE MORNING AFTER THE DESTRUCTION OF EMERALD SPAR: PRESENT DAY, 15 A.E.

Bernie found it hard to tel what hit people hardest when they heard the news about the imulsion platform.

The mood around New Jacinto felt like a communal bereavement. Even Mac trotted along beside her with his head lowered. She walked through the construction sites and new dirt roads that now stretched a few kilometers out into the farmland to the north, and tried to work out if this was the point at which the Old Jacinto population, the folks who’d stoical y endured unending grub attacks and privation for fifteen years, would final y snap.

It wasn’t about the fuel. They didn’t give a shit about shortages of things they’d never had much of anyway. It was about hope being dashed again and again. There were only so many times you could take something away from people, hand it back, and then snatch it away again. It broke them. It made them shut down.

Whatever the Lambent were, they were worse than the grubs. And they were out there somewhere, in forms and shapes that people couldn’t even begin to guess at.

I really thought it was over. I really thought the worst monsters we had to face from now on were going to be human .

“Hey, dog-lady!” The shout made her turn. It was the Gorasni sailor cal ed Yanik who seemed to have struck up a rapport with Baird. Friendship was too strong a word. “The shit gets deeper, yes?”

“I’m real y sorry about your mates on the rig,” she said careful y. It wasn’t the time to mention fuel shortages. “Poor bastards.”

“So what use are we to you now? No fancy frigate, no imulsion, and your doctor thinks we are al murdering scum. The old Pelruan soldiers cross the road to avoid us. I think our wedding is over.”

“Honeymoon,” Bernie said automatical y. “The phrase is the honeymoon’s over.”

The conversation had turned very awkward very fast. Mac must have sensed her shift of mood, because he stood growling at the back of his throat in his let-me-kil -him pose—ears forward, lip curled back, eyes fixed on the threat. Bernie held her hand against her leg and snapped her fingers to distract him.

“You think it is?” Yanik asked. He didn’t seem bothered by the growling at al , or maybe he had a lot of faith in her ability to control Mac. “Because Trescu is now in trouble, I think. And that is not good for anybody.”

Nothing was clear-cut for Bernie these days.

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