Volume 8: Telophase

Issue 4: Brinkmanship

Jannette Adrian Churchwell

By Nova

The cloud of smoke dissipated in the wind—within moments, reduced to nothing more than a hazy trace on the side of the shimmering blue shield dome. Shouting spread through the field hospital, as panicked medics demanded answers from stone-faced soldiers. “A-are we under attack?” My question was directed at a couple of medics who rushed past me, but it was barely audible over the growing turmoil.

“Cool!” Miasma shouted back, striding into the crowd. “Come on.” She motioned to me. “Let’s find out what’s going on!”

I sighed, glancing back at the tent full of patients in critical condition behind us. Miasma sounded more excited than concerned, but—if we were under attack—that did change everything. We’d have to make precautions, join the fight if we needed to… Reluctantly, I followed her through the crowd—trying to keep her dark, billowing cloak in the center of my vision at all times.

“Hear that?” she said, raising a hand to her ears.

I didn’t hear anything over the shouts of the crowd, and wasn’t sure how she could through the thick fabric wrapped over her head. But, after a moment or two, I picked something up over the incoherent babble of voices around us. I heard shouting. Angry shouting… A strict departure from the panicked voices that surrounded us. Miasma was already moving toward it, and I followed close. Anger implied someone had a better idea what was going on than the rest of us.

It looked like others had the same idea because—as we neared the noise of the shouting—others moved alongside us. As we approached the center of the camp, our destination became clear. A growing crowd had surrounded a tent, distinguished by the antennas sticking out from it. It must have been a command center of some kind.

Miasma didn’t stop at the back of the throng. Instead, with interjections of “Comin’ through!” and “Move it!”, she pushed her way through the dense crowd.

I followed close behind, making sure to mutter apologies to those Miasma thrust aside. But, quickly, I didn’t need to. As soon as people realized who was coming, they parted around the villain—not wanting to get in her path. I caught cautious looks as the crowd around us looked me and Miasma up and down… and a part of me hoped Miasma’s infamy wouldn’t rub off on me.

But these thoughts vanished from my mind once we reached the front of the crowd. Now, I could see the source of the angry shouting. Near the front of the front of the tent, a gaggle of soldier-types stood—screaming angrily at a group of men and women in business suits. However, these suits weren’t just taking it. If anything, they screamed even louder than the soldiers, their shrill voices cutting through the April chill like knives. Between them, stood special-agent-in-charge Theodore Kelly, who stared—ashen-faced—into air. A few FBI agents stood behind him, muttering something inaudible to him… though he didn’t seem to hear what they were saying.

But who really caught my eye was a man standing to the rear of the suits. He was a tall, slender figure, and wore a white lab coat quite evocative of mine. However, instead of a blue face mask, he wore an all-concealing silver helmet. It was featureless, and almost mirror-like in how it reflected the scene around him.

“Darwinist,” Miasma muttered, a little mischievously. “Took him long enough to show that pretty face…”

I wondered, for a moment, whether Miasma had a history with one of IMAGO’s corporate-owned heroes—but my attention was quickly back on the shouting match between the military and what I assumed was a collection of IMAGO representatives. What they were shouting about quickly became clear as Darwinist stepped forward, motioning with one hand for the IMAGO reps to let him speak. The military quieted down as he approached and—as his piercing voice cut over the murmurs of the crowd—I heard him make his case.

“…IMAGO property, worth billions I might add, cannot be put at risk in-” Darwinist said, his voice a shrill monotone. A deep, rough voice quickly cut him off.

“You cannot expect that the United States will clean up your mess without causing some damage in the process.” From behind the cohort of soldiers, stepped an older man in military fatigues. He was entirely bald, with liver spots on the top of his head. His skin was pinkish, but clearly worn and wrinkled from past exposure to the sun.

From a distance, I couldn’t see what rank he might be… But I didn’t have to. The voice was familiar enough. General William Olstien, the William Olstien, general of the eleventh army—or the home army. A force designed to rapidly respond to crises on American soil… He was the one who pushed back the New Men, and put an end to the New Mexico Meltdown. He was also the man who led the defense of Wichita and Charleston, and recommended their annihilation when the situation got out of control.

Less officially, we called him the Janitor, or Mr. Clean, or…

“The Butcher,” Miasma murmured beside me. Her eyes locked onto the general, her expression unreadable under her mask. Yet, something about her tone sounded… wary.

It was no surprise, really, that he was here. I hadn’t been paying attention to the news, but I remembered hearing something on the plane ride to Redding about the president declaring martial law in California and Oregon. That—plus the devastation I’d seen in Redding and the small towns we’d flown over on our way to the Extinction Refuge—left me thinking that of course Olstien would be leading the counter-attack against the First Way.

But, if he were here, that meant the government was done taking prisoners. The military was going to slaughter their way through the First Way, and us heroes and villains were going to help them. Break our taboo about mass-killing… It happened back in the New Mexico Meltdown, where heroes were given orders to kill the cartel’s enforcers on sight. But, back then, I had been fortunate enough to be working triage… I never even saw an enemy.

I doubted I would be that lucky this time.

But Olstien didn’t sound like a “Butcher” when he spoke. “The longer we remain here,” he said calmly, “the greater the chance that the First Way regroups and attacks us here. If you’re concerned about property da-”

“I appreciate your perspective, General,” Darwinist interrupted, “but if you continue on this path, you’ll accomplish little. Your crude attempt to breach the shield was a failure.”

Crude attempt? I realized in a flash that the explosion must have been the military’s attempt to bring the shield down. The First Way hadn’t attacked—yet. I suddenly felt more relaxed, though the tension between Olstien and Darwinist didn’t drop a notch.

“And the longer you keep us stuck here, those terrorists are just going to gather their strength. We need decisive action,” Olstien retorted.

“IMAGO will not allow the needless and futile destruction of their property,” Darwinist said. I nearly scoffed that that was what IMAGO was worried about—not the hundreds of lives at risk inside the shield dome. But, if Darwinist was even remotely ashamed, he gave no sign of it as he stared straight toward Olstien.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” Kelly slowly said, glancing between the two men. “We need to consider the safety of those still trap-”

Olstien cut him off. “What are you still doing here, Kelly?”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“I-I’m sorry?” Kelly asked.

“This isn’t your business Kelly, so don’t waste my time.”

“I-I think it is my busi-”

“You’re off the case, Kelly,” Olstien said, crossing his arms. The muzak of the crowd shifted to a chorus of whispered murmurs, while Kelly gaped wide-eyed at the general.

“O-on whose authority?” Kelly managed to ask.

Olstien’s face was expressionless. “The President’s,” was all he said.

“I-I…” Kelly stammered, not finding whatever words he was looking for.

Olstien glanced away from Kelly, toward the crowd that had gathered around the squabbling parties. While it was mainly a crowd of baseliners—medics and soldiers mostly—I wasn’t the only hero in the rabble. Standing on the other side of the crowd, I saw a gaggle of Starlight heroes: Thunderbolt, Solar Flare, Neon-Racer… They must be watching for the same reason I was. After all, last I heard Kelly was in charge of us heroes… What would happen now?

“That’s right,” Olstien called to the crowd, though I had no doubt who he was really talking to. “The FBI’s mishandled the situation for too long. This operation is under my command now. If anyone has any questions…”

There were none. The crowd fell deadly silent as Olstien’s gaze flickered over us, resting momentarily upon me and Miasma. While I shrunk back as his eyes settled on me, Miasma didn’t seem to mind, and instead stared back in rapt attention.

“Good,” Olstien cleared his throat. “Then, as soon as we’ve evacuated this oversized zoo, we’re taking the fight to those bastards. We’re gonna chase them to the ends of the Earth, burn them out of the forest they’re hiding in.”

The crowd around me began to murmur in approval, though the Starlight group on the other side of the crowd just whispered to each other.

“You’re all dismissed!” Olstien shouted, and the murmuring crowd slowly began to disperse.

“Let’s get out of here,” I whispered to Miasma. But, before I could turn to leave, she grabbed the sleeve of my lab coat.

“Nuh-uh. I wanna see what happens next,” she said.

I sighed. “Come on, I don’t think our patie-”

“They’ll last a few minutes easy. Plus, don’t you wanna see what happens?” She sounded downright giddy as Olstien turned back to Darwinist, a scowl on his face.

I had to admit, I did want to see what the result of their debate would be…

“We should take this inside. I don’t think all of our audience caught the memo,” Olstien grumbled pointedly at us and the Starlight heroes, who also hadn’t moved from their spots.

“I’d rather have an audience to this brazen breach of IMAGO’s rights as an American corporation!” Darwinist retorted.

Even from a distance, I could see Olstien’s eyes roll. “Fine. Have it your way.” He turned his head to face the tent behind him and called, “Cuckoo!”

There was silence for a moment or two followed by a brief clunking and clanking of metal against metal. At once it stopped, and a pale woman in a tight, olive green, latex suit emerged from the tent. Wires and cables jutted out of every angle of her body, with a particularly large number of them streaming from the back of her head. She was bald, but the mass of cables in her skull almost gave her the appearance of hair. The cables dragged behind her as she walked, trailing back into the tent.

“Yeah?” she asked, her voice surprisingly high-pitched.

“Cuckoo, this is Darwinist. He wants to know what Plan B is,” Olstien said.

“I most certainly do not! I merely want to protest the military’s unju-” Darwinist started, but Olstien cut him off.

“Just tell him what we’re doing to his precious zoo, Cuckoo.”

The woman—Cuckoo, presumably—groaned and looked Darwinist up and down. “Since the use of two Mark 86 smart munitions proved ineffective against your… ‘zoo,’ I’ve been ordered to infiltrate the Refuge’s surviving intranet to identify alternative ways of deactivating your ludicrously over-the-top security precautions.”

“Impossible,” Darwinist said. “The First Way left a virus that locked all major systems up when they seized our control centers…”

“That’s only true from your inadequate definition of ‘major,’” Cuckoo responded. “Diagnostic systems remain active, and—while the security system requires IMAGO identity verification to access—those for the subterranean reactors underneath the zoo do not. I can only wonder what reasons your system admins had to make such an important system defended only by a few firewalls and logic-snoops…” She momentarily ran her fingers along a stray wire hanging over her shoulder. “But I nonetheless appreciate their decision. After all, thanks to their oversight, I’ll be able to force all the reactors into a diagnostic overloop.” Cuckoo suddenly smiled wildly. “This will have the benefit of inciting a meltdown in the reactors, thus cutting power and deactivating the shield.”

I couldn’t see Darwinist’s face under his mask but, as he recoiled back from Cuckoo, I could only assume he was horrified. I felt the same. He started, “Y-you can’t-”

Cuckoo shrugged. “Maybe you can’t. This is a pretty basic operation for someone of my caliber.”

“N-no, I mean… doing this would irradiate the groundwater… The whole property would have to be abandoned… It would be an ecological disaster!” Darwinist cried.

Cuckoo smiled back. “To make an omelet you have to break a few eggs.”

Miasma clapped her hands together. “I like her,” she whispered to me.

“Shush,” I hissed at her, annoyance momentarily overtaking my horror at the military’s plan to irradiate the area.

“Of course,” Olstien said, taking a step toward Darwinist, “such proactive measures wouldn’t need to be taken if we had the info needed for the system’s ‘identity verification…’”

Cuckoo nodded. “If we had full profiles of every IMAGO employee… I could carve through the ICE around the shield’s systems like a hot knife through butter. I’d be prepared for any eventuality.”

“B-but that’s a gross invasion of the privacy of IMAGO employees, shareholders…” Darwinist trailed off.

Cuckoo shrugged, turning to Olstien. “Looks like he’s choosing meltdown.”

“A shame. I was hoping we wouldn’t have to establish an exclusion zone in California…” Olstien responded.

The two groups stood in silence, staring each other down. Somehow, the image took me back to a memory of a close game of Icons I had with Holly. Neither of us could make a move without risking mutual annihilation, and she said that the game had become the Cold War in miniature. “It’s brinkmanship,” she had said, motioning at the brutal front line that had developed between us. Brinkmanship, she explained, was something politicians did back in the Cold War. Basically, it was the idea that the US or Soviets could get what they wanted by escalating things—pushing things to the brink of nuclear war. We put missiles in Turkey, they put them in Cuba. They sent heroes to North Vietnam, we sent them to South Vietnam. The idea was to put forward a credible threat to force the other side to concede, or face annihilation.

I had the feeling that Olstien and Cuckoo were masters of brinkmanship. As Darwinist fidgeted with his hands, I could almost see the gears turning in his brain. “W-wait,” he said, after a few moments of silence. “I’ll bring your… concerns to my managers… We’ll see what we can do. Just give us time.”

Olstien nodded. “You have until tomorrow. If we don’t get the information we need… One way or another, that shield’s coming down.”

Darwinist stuffed his hands into his lab coat pockets, spun on his heel, and strode away from Olstien—the gaggle of IMAGO suits in tow. Cuckoo turned to Olstien. “I’m going to get the trojans ready,” she said, and walked back into the tent—her wires dragging on the dirt behind her.

But, before Olstien could leave, Thunderbolt strode up to him. “That was some show, Bill,” he said.

“Ah, Thunderbolt. It’s been a while,” Olstien said, taking a tablet from a nearby soldier. “I hope you found it entertaining.”

“Entertaining is not the word I’d use to describe it,” Thunderbolt said, dryly. “I’m concerned that-”

“Thunderbolt, let’s have this conversation in private,” Olstien said, glaring at Miasma and I. “When I say that you’re dismissed I really mean it. Get back to work!”

Miasma gave the general a double thumbs up. “You got it, boss!” she shouted. “Come on, Stitch, show’s really over now.”

I followed close behind her as we strode back toward the field hospital. I shot a look behind me. Thunderbolt followed Olstien into the command tent, while the other two Starlight heroes remained outside. While Miasma was almost skipping back to the hospital, I felt a heavy weight resting on my shoulders. Was the military really planning on irradiating the area if IMAGO didn’t play along? The thought that this crisis could get as bad as the New Mexico Meltdown, or even Wichita, made me want to find Holly and get out of here as soon as possible. The only bright side was that Starlight seemed to feel the same… Or, at least the same about irradiating Northern California. Hopefully Thunderbolt was going to set Olstien straight…

“What do you think they’re gonna talk about?” I asked Miasma, as we reached the rows of medical tents.

“Probably lame-o politics.” Miasma shrugged. “But I bet we heard all we needed to know.”

“And what would that be?”

Miasma cocked her head to the side. I had the feeling she smiled underneath her mask. “Didn’t you hear? Those corpo asshats are definitely gonna roll over for the military. But they’re not gonna do it right away.”

“So?”

“So… We got ‘till tomorrow to fix everyone up. Then… we get to kill some fuckin’ dinosaurs!”