Life after the fall, p.1
Life After The Fall, page 1
G J Ogden
Life After The Fall
(A Post Apocalyptic Science Fiction Thriller)
First published by Ogden Media Limited 2019
Copyright © 2019 by G J Ogden
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
G J Ogden asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
First edition
Editing by S L Ogden
Cover art by germancreative
This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy
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Contents
Foreword
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Thank you
About the Author
Also by G J Ogden
Foreword
This book serves as a short introduction to the world and characters of The Planetsider Trilogy, and takes place immediately before the events of book one, The Planetsider. For those who are unfamiliar with the story of The Planetsider, it will help to give you an exciting taste of the saga to come, and for those who have already read The Planetsider Trilogy, it provides some previously unwritten backstory that I hope will enhance your appreciation of the trilogy.
Whether you’re a new or a current reader, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!
For more information on my books and to stay up-to-date with new releases, as well as great books by other sci-fi authors, please join my mailing list.
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Other books in this series:
The Planetsider
The Second Fall
The Last of the Firsts
Chapter 1
A narrow streak of light flashed overhead, barely visible against the brightening dawn sky, which bathed the walled settlement of Forest Gate in a warm orange hue. Most others would have missed it, but Ethan had spent long enough staring up at these mysterious flashes to know how to spot them.
“What are you looking at, Uncle Ethan?” said a little voice. Ethan looked down to find Elijah standing behind him; the boy shared his adventurous uncle’s talent for stealth, though Ethan felt a little embarrassed that he’d managed to creep up on him so easily. As a ranger, Ethan’s training had attuned his senses to the smallest of movements and sounds, so that roamers and the maddened could not pass close to the settlement undetected, or manage to prey on the foraging parties that the rangers escorted and protected while outside Forest Gate’s high stone walls.
“Oh, nothing,” said Ethan, telling a white lie. Elijah’s mother, Katie, didn’t like Ethan filling his nephew’s head with ideas of adventure, or the notion that one day he would follow his uncle into the ranks of the rangers. And she especially frowned upon her brother telling Elijah anything relating to the past and especially about the Fall – the catastrophic event that had laid waste to the entire planet generations ago. Though, in truth, neither Ethan nor anyone else knew much about the Fall or the civilization that preceded it. Of the few that survived the apocalyptic event, most succumbed to the Maddening, a sickness that still plagued the wastelands and ruined cities over a century later. The Maddening twisted those afflicted into roamers, people stripped of empathy and conscience, who preyed on unwary travelers. But as the Maddening bit deeper, the changes would become more severe, warping not only a person’s mind, but their body too. Ethan had heard faerie stories of monsters and ghouls as a child, but nothing came close to the reality of the maddened.
Yet, by some twist of fate – or more likely chance – a small number of people survived the Fall and even developed a resistance to the toxic soils and rains that came after, sparing them from the horrific consequences of the Maddening. This hardiness was then passed down through the generations, eventually to Ethan and the other settlers of Forest Gate. Sadly, the in-born resistance to the Maddening was the only inheritance handed down by these first survivors. Due to the collapse of society and destruction of the cities, practically no record of the past remained, and so nothing was known of the pre-Fall world, beyond a few fragmented stories and rumors that only a handful of older settlers could recall, and even fewer cared to discuss. That was how Katie preferred it, and how the other inhabitants of Forest Gate and the other settlements preferred it too. Talk of the Fall and what came before was feared and discouraged by everyone; everyone, that was, except Ethan.
On this occasion, Ethan decided not to fill his nephew’s head with exciting ideas and mysteries, largely because he was about to head out with a scouting party and didn’t have the time, but also because the story of the Fall was likely something he had not yet been told about, and innocence was a precious thing to be cherished for as long as possible. Until he could no longer be spared knowledge of the horrors of their world.
“I’m just enjoying the sunrise while I wait for the other rangers to get here,” Ethan added, which was actually the truth.
“You mean Aunt Summer?” asked Elijah, brightly.
“I don’t only go on scouting parties with Summer, you know,” replied Ethan, a little defensively. He was aware, as was everyone else in Forest Gate according to local tittle-tattle, that folk considered Ethan and Summer to be the worst kept secret in all the surviving twenty-seven settlements. But, as was usually the case with most things in the broken and beleaguered post-Fall world they all inhabited, the truth was more complicated. He and Summer were close, but they were just fellow rangers; a relationship built on mutual respect and admiration. Perhaps once, when they were both younger, it could have blossomed into something more, but that wasn’t to be and now Summer was merely a friend. Though, as someone with a reputation for being guarded and even a little standoffish around others, the fact she was the only person outside of Katie and Elijah that he enjoyed spending time with spoke volumes. She was as much family to Ethan as his sister and nephew were.
“My ears are burning. What are you two gossiping about?”
Ethan and Elijah both looked around to see Summer standing a few meters away, hands on hips, bow slung over her left shoulder and vibrant red hair flowing across the quiver of arrows on her back, like thousands of strands of fire.
“I was just saying that uncle Ethan only ever...” Elijah began, but Ethan cut him off.
“He was only saying too much, as usual...” Ethan said, playfully knocking Elijah off balance with a nudge of his hip. Then Ethan quickly changed the subject, “So, where’s the door man so we can get moving?”
Summer rolled her eyes, “That joke never gets any funnier, you know? Dorman’s on the way now,” she said and then walked up beside Elijah and placed a hand on his shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Does your mom know you’re out here?”
“Yes...” said Elijah, clearly lying.
“You’re a terrible liar, just like your uncle,” said Summer, smiling down at him, “But seeing as you’re already here, you may as well give us a sendoff!”
“I get the blame for being a bad influence, but really it’s all your fault,” Ethan protested, as Elijah hugged his aunt, his roguish smile reaching from ear to ear.
“That’s the way I like it!” Summer laughed, before swiftly punching Ethan on the shoulder, and heading off towards the main settlement gates, “Come on, ranger, the wastelands won’t scout themselves...”
Ethan rubbed his arm and then noticed Elijah smirking, and his eyes narrowed, “You won’t find it so funny when she does it to you,” he warned, “Summer is famous for punishing ranger recruits only slightly less severely than she does roamers.”
“That’s okay, I can’t become an apprentice ranger for a few more years yet, anyway,” said Elijah, completely missing the point. Then Elijah’s expression darkened, “You’ll be okay out there, though, won’t you Uncle Ethan? Mom always worries; you know, about roamers and the maddened?”
Ethan knelt down and held his nephew’s shoulders. Smiling, he said, “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine. And besides, I have Summer to protect me. I’ve never seen a roamer that scares me more than she does!” Elijah chuckled and the vibrancy returned to his cheeks and eyes. Ethan released his grip and nodded towards the huge metal gate, reclaimed from one of the decimated compounds that lay at the outskirts of the vast, destroyed city that sprawled out for miles at the foot of the valley, a few day’s travel away. “Now, why don’t you run up onto the platform above the gate so you can watch us leave?”
Elijah didn’t need telling twice, and immediately sprinted off to the gate to climb up the ladder that lead to the ranger platform at the top. Katie would unleash all kinds of mother’s fury on him if she knew that was where he’d gone, but since Ethan would be outside the settlement walls for the next few days, he would be spared her wrath, at least until he got back.
Ethan then spotted the third member of their scouting party, a senior ranger called Rex Dorman, approaching the gate and ordering it
“Great, I get to be the third wheel with you two again,” complained Dorman as Ethan hustled up beside him.
Summer sighed and glowered at Dorman to make sure he was aware of her annoyance. She was used to the thinly veiled innuendo by now, especially from Dorman, but she also gave as good as she got. “Well, we did ask around for other volunteers, but no-one else came forward,” she said, the corner of her mouth curled into a smirk. “It’s odd, because they were all so keen until we mentioned you were coming…”
“Very funny, ranger,” said Dorman, becoming more stern and assertive, his standard fallback position whenever someone got the better of him in a contest of wits, which was all the time when it came to Summer. “Let’s get this done; I don’t want to spend any longer with you two love-birds than I have to.”
Dorman headed out first, but Ethan and Summer waited for a few seconds before following, to allow enough of a distance to open up between them and the older, more senior ranger so that they couldn’t be overheard.
“Try not to wind him up too much on this one, he’s even more miserable company when he’s grumpy,” said Ethan, as the gate creaked shut behind them.
“Yes, but that still makes him better company than you,” Summer replied, and she punched Ethan on the arm again and swept ahead to avoid the possibly of retaliation, hair flowing behind her like liquid fire. Ethan heard the faint cackle of laughter carried on the wind and looked back to see Elijah peering over the wall, laughing and waving.
Chapter 2
Captain Maria Salus and Commander Christopher Kurren stood outside the door to Governor Archer’s office, waiting to be summoned inside. They had been standing there for around ten minutes and the wait was starting to make Maria fidgety; her foot was tapping and her exhalations of breath were increasingly morphing into elaborate, impatient sighs.
Kurren glanced across at her, eyebrows raised, “You’re going to wear a hole in the damn deck plating if you don’t stop tapping your foot, Sal.”
Maria’s foot stopped tapping, though her next labored sigh was directed at her partner. “We’ve been out here for nearly thirty minutes,” she complained, “what the hell are they still talking about?”
“It hasn’t even been ten minutes, Captain Exaggeration,” said Kurren, calmly returning his gaze to the name plate on the door, which read, ‘Governor Thomas Archer, Universal Energy Corporation’. “Besides, you know Archer, he can talk and talk and still not say anything.”
“Sure, but the only other person in there is your brother, who is hardly known for his conversation skills.”
Kurren laughed and then smiled at Maria, “You must be the only person on this entire moon base who likes that guy less than I do.”
“All I can say is you must have inherited all the charm genes in your family, old man,” said Maria, “and that’s not saying much.”
“Ouch, Sal, that was a low blow,” Kurren replied, pressing his hands to his chest, as if his heart was about to explode. Maria grinned and then went back to standing easy, and sighing periodically as they waited. Her foot began tapping again.
“Can pilots still fly without the use of their right foot?” mused Kurren, glancing down at Maria’s bobbing boot as if it were deliberately mocking him, “Speaking hypothetically of course, you know, in case you suddenly and unexpectedly fall afoul of a terrible accident…”
“If you prefer, I can shove my foot up your decrepit old...”
The door slid open with a hiss and Maria just managed to cut the sentence short. Both Maria and Kurren straightened to attention as the form of Governor Archer appeared before them, wearing a casual, easy smile.
“I’m sorry, Captain Salus, am I interrupting something?” queried Archer. The darkness of his tone contrasted with his easy smile, somehow adding to its quiet menace.
“No sir,” said Maria, tensing her muscles even more tightly and staring directly ahead, as if the Governor was invisible.
“Good, then please step inside, both of you,” Archer continued, “We have serious matters to discuss.” He turned his back on them and returned to the huge hardwood desk at the back of his office, above which hung the UEC logo, machined from a solid block of titanium. It looked out of place in an office that otherwise had the more homely appearance of a centuries-old study. Just to the left of the desk stood Major James Kurren, Christopher Kurren’s older brother. If Archer’s passive-aggressive greeting hadn’t already been enough to cause the pit of Maria’s stomach to tighten, the sight of the Major’s unyielding, soldierly expression did the trick. As she stepped further inside the office, it felt as if the temperature had dropped by several degrees, despite every sector on the UEC moon base being maintained at a steady twenty-five degrees Celsius.
Major Kurren merely glowered briefly at Maria and then nodded towards his younger brother, who returned the grudging gesture of respect with a nod of his own.
Archer slowly circumnavigated the desk, as if pacing away at the front of a funeral cortège, before reaching his black, high-backed chair and slowly lowering himself into it. There was a brief silence while Archer rested his elbows on the desk and then looked at Maria and Kurren, carefully choosing his next words. Despite still wearing his easy smile, the dark circles around the Governor’s eyes and the new flecks of gray in his short-cropped brown hair betrayed the obvious stress he was under.
“In consultation with my military advisers from the Security Corp,” Archer began, glancing towards Major Kurren standing by his side like a sentry, “I have decided to proceed with the planetsider mission.” He noted the eyes of both Christopher Kurren and Maria Salus widen slightly as he said this, both surprised that he would countenance such an ambitious and drastic plan. “And, as I am sure you have both already realized, your presence here confirms your selection for the mission,” Archer went on, before slowly lifting his elbows off the desk and sitting upright in the high-backed chair with his fingers pressed together in a pyramid. For the first time since opening the door to Maria and Chris Kurren, his easy smile dropped away. “I do not need to impress upon you both the significance of this mission to the future of the UEC,” the Governor went on, “It places you both at terrible risk, but I am convinced now that it is the only way to safeguard our civilization and ensure our enduring future.”
“We understand, sir,” said Maria, nervous energy compelling her to say something for fear of spontaneously combusting if she kept quiet. “We won’t let you down.” She glanced across to her partner, who in stark contrast to herself looked like he was in a hypnotic state of meditation; if the news had stirred any emotions inside him, it was impossible to tell. This was one of the reasons they worked so well as a team; Chris Kurren was unflappable, dependable and exactly the sort of person to have by your side in a crisis. In contrast, Maria was impulsive and headstrong, which despite her brilliance and exceptional capabilities as a pilot, would often get her into trouble; trouble that Chris Kurren usually got her out of.
“Your objective is to secure the cooperation of a planetsider and return with them to this base,” Major Kurren grunted, “preferably, their willing cooperation, but if not then you are to retrieve a planetsider by any means necessary. Our survival depends on this, is that clear?”
“Don’t worry, Major, we can be very persuasive,” Kurren chipped in, with the lightest suggestion of playfulness, which Maria knew was done intentionally to wind up his brother. Their competitiveness was down to more than just brotherly rivalry; Major James Kurren looked down on the Flying Corp, and especially on his brother’s feisty and – in his eyes frequently insubordinate – female partner, which made their relationship particularly frosty. Maria noted from the tightening of the Major’s cheeks and the narrowing of his cold eyes that it appeared to have had the desired effect.
