The Art of Denial...

 

There are those who find looking for patterns in history...patterns of racist white dominance, specifically... unpalatable.  They claim acknowledging that the systemic dehumanization of blacks by whites spawned in the days of slavery continues to permeate our social fabric in many ways, both subtle and overt, perpetuating patterns of social inequity and violence, is unjust; that it punishes the whites of today for the crimes of their ancestors and perpetuates unwarranted anger among blacks and tragic self-hatred among whites.

But, it's not about recrimination.  It's about recognizing patterns in our society which, through the decades of freedom marches, boycotts, civil rights legislation and affirmative action continues to manifest in suspicious patterns of racially stilted hiring practices, inequities in housing and medical care, and innumerable police bullets finding their way into unarmed black suspects.

Many whites don't want to acknowledge these patterns.  It's easier not to.  Less demanding.  So much easier to just brush racism aside as a minor annoyance than to admit it's a basic human failing cultivated by American history.  One that's still operating inside each of us in ways we may not even be aware of. 

If our white-centered, self-congratulatory version of history continues to prevail, then racism at all levels must continue to eat away at our society, the gulf between the races growing ever wider and ever more insurmountable.  The average white American may continue to see the average black American as genetically inferior; a crime waiting to happen.  An attitude which perpetuates social inequity, which in turn perpetuates crime.  An endless circle.  Ignoring or denying racism will not make it vanish.  Only acknowledging its historical origins can do that.

This short story illustrates the time-honored principle that those who forget history are...in this case, literally...doomed to relive it.

*******

REMEMBRANCE

 

2122 A.D.

The American science sub glided silently under the South Pacific…

Julia clenched her fist, her nerves frayed as the argument between Roger and Tarrence finally drew to a close.  She’d tried desperately to keep her mind on the monitors and computer data, but it had been like sitting through an artillery duel.  Tarrence had glared at her as he’d stormed off the bridge, his keen eyes stabbing through her like a knife.  She winced, hating herself for not coming to his defense.  She felt like a coward.  She reflexively passed her hand over her stomach, swallowing in a dry throat, a bitter taste in her mouth.  She blinked back the tears.  Could she do it?  Did she have the courage not to? 

Roger sighed as he stepped over to her.  “Anything new?” he asked quietly.

“No,” she responded flatly, not meeting his eyes as she brought up the computer analysis of the magnetic field recordings.  The graphic of the wormhole formed on the computer screen, a tube linking two plains.  “But, the readings are constant.  If and when it opens, the coordinates will be the same.  We are where we need to be.”  She couldn’t help reflecting on the capacity of human beings to fail to see the obvious.  The 21^st century had nearly drawn to a close by the time the world’s scientists finally realized incessant UFO sightings were extraterrestrial in nature.  It had taken them years after that to determine that the reason these alien ships were appearing and disappearing inexplicably was because they were coming and going through a trans-dimensional wormhole linking Earth with the black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy.  Used apparently as a power source by aliens to operate a trans-galactic sub-space rapid transit system.

Roger sat beside her, re-checking the readings.  “I’m sorry you had to see that.  He’s becoming quite militant, I’m afraid.”

Her blood boiled.  She couldn’t take it anymore.  “Exactly how would you react in his place?” she forced out.

“Just what is that supposed to mean?  How could I be in his place?  I’m not…him.”

“You’re not black.”  There, she’d said it.  Let him put it on her psych report.

“Not this again.  Look…I’ve treated him with the same respect I would any other member of this team.  We all have.”

“That’s not the point, and you know it.”  She managed to look directly at him.  “His academic achievements and efficiency reports are as high as anyone else’s.”

“Obviously, or he wouldn’t have been selected for this expedition.”

“And yet, you haven’t recommended him for promotion.  In spite of his going above and beyond consistently.  He’s put in twice the effort of any Level 2 science officer, he qualified for an expedition that few could even hope for, and he keeps getting passed over.  Why?”

“You know why.  I don’t make the rules.  Promotion is based on A.I.-formulated stats… social averages… group tendencies….”

Her heart was throbbing.  She couldn’t hold it in anymore.  “Why don’t you just say it?  Our society has labeled his ethnic group genetically inferior.”

He stood up… as though reflexively distancing himself from her.  “That’s the kind of thinking that ends careers.  Look… I know it doesn’t seem fair.  It isn’t, in a sense.  But, we’re scientists.  We have to accept the inescapable conclusions of statistical data.  There’s a reason why his… his group has predominantly and consistently occupied the lowest strata of western civilization.  In everything.  Employment.  Income.  Housing.  And, there are the crime rates to consider.  Stats don’t lie.  His people had the same opportunities our ancestors did, and have achieved far less.  There are exceptions, of course.  Tarrence is one of them.  But, we can’t accommodate every individual in a race… a socio-ethnic group which is… well, statistically inferior.”

She glared at him.  “You can say that as a scientist.  Even though every bit of genetic, physiological and evolutionary data proves beyond any doubt there is absolutely no intrinsic difference…”

“Just because we haven’t isolated the causal genetic differentiation doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.  We know it must.  What other explanation is there?”

She closed her eyes, sighing in exasperation.  “You’re making it easier for me to make my decision.”  A chill ran through her.  She’d avoided discussing it, though he’d been like a silent, hovering presence ever since the pregnancy test had come back positive.  She evaded his cold stare.

“I can challenge it, you know.”

“You don’t have standing, now that the divorce is final, and you know it.”  She clenched the arms of her chair.  She so wanted to scream it out, but she couldn’t just throw her life away.  “I will not…”

She started as the red light flashed, the klaxon blaring… the pre-programmed computer alarm sounding.  ALERT.  ALERT.  MAGNETIC SHIFT DETECTED.  WORMHOLE ACTIVATION IMMENENT.

Her fingers flew over the computer keys, the analysis coming up.  “Confirmed,” she said, her heart racing.  “This is it.”

“Tarrence, to the bridge,” Roger shouted into the intercom.  “It’s opening.”

Tarrence rode the lift up from the lower deck and dashed to his station, activating the scanners with lightning speed.  “Magnetic perturbations detected and plotted,” he said.  “Course laid in.”

Roger assumed his place at the coordination center.  “Course dead ahead east,” he said, plotting the coordinates on his board.  “Prepare to surface.”

As the sub broke water, Julia lifted the shields from the view port.  And, there it was.  Her jaw dropped.  A gateway into infinity…a twisting kaleidoscope of shifting colors and warping space appearing in a vast circular aperture floating in mid-air above the ocean surface.  Nothing she’d seen in the computer simulations had prepared her for this.  Regaining her senses, she checked the radar sweeps.  “Exiting contacts confirmed.”  A split second later, a half dozen or so alien craft emerged from the rift.  Time was short.  It wouldn’t stay open long.

“Engage lift jets!” Roger ordered.

“Engaged,” Tarrence acknowledged as the immense vertical rotors lifted the sub into mid-air.  “Magna field activated.  Engaging aft thrusters.”

Julia was thrust backward against her seat as the sub became an aircraft, diving headlong into the alien star gate.  “Dear God…” she whispered as the light engulfed them.  “We made it.”   She strapped in as the ship trembled wildly around her, the readings going crazy.

“Fluctuations in the magna field,” Tarrence announced.  “Attempting to compensate.”

“Roger…” Julia said in a breathless whisper, unable to believe her eyes.  “The chronometers are going whacky.  This is…”

A blinding flash of white light swallowed everything.

She felt hot sun, heard wild screams and smelled smoke.  She opened her eyes.  She was standing in a village of burning huts.  Screaming black natives were being driven from their homes by white men in archaic clothing.  16^th century?  The whites were howling and setting fire to the huts with torches.  The blacks were being beaten down and shackled.  Some of the black villagers attacked the whites with spears, and were blasted down with primitive muskets.  Was she dreaming?  Or, had she died and gone to hell?

“Where the hell are we?” Roger demanded.

“Central Africa, 1535,” Tarrence declared, checking his portable com pad.  Julia’s mind was spinning.  Tarrence roared as he picked up a spear from a fallen black warrior and thrust it into the gut of a white man as he tried to grab a fleeing village girl.

“Damned heathen,” another white man shouted as he aimed a pistol at Tarrence.

“No!” Julia shouted as she threw herself against the man, knocking him off balance and grabbing the pistol as it fired.  Another blinding flash.  She found herself back at her bridge station on the sub.  She looked around.  Tarrence and Roger were back at their stations too.  “Was it real?” she asked, barely able to speak.

“That had to be some kind of shared hallucination,” Roger exclaimed, wiping cold sweat from his forehead.

“This looks real enough,” she said, picking up the recently spent single shot pistol from where she’d dropped it on the deck.

“Real as this graze on my shoulder,” Tarrence said, his hand coming away from his shoulder smeared with blood.  “I think you just saved my life, Jules.  Thank you.”

Before she could even think, another flash swallowed them.  This time she found herself on the rolling decks of an old wooden sailing ship at sea.  Wild screams…a battle.  Sabers clashed, muskets firing.  Blacks were breaking their chains, attacking the white crew that held them in bondage.

“Where this time?” Roger asked.

“Mid-Atlantic.  1683,” Tarrence answered.  “According to the computer.”

One of the sailors pointed a pistol at an enraged black man covered in blood as he attacked the sailor, swinging a broken chain.  Tarrence picked up a sword and hacked off the sailor’s gun hand.  The white man screamed as the black smashed in his head with the chain.  Another white flash, and they were back on the sub again.

“Another souvenir,” Tarrence said, holding up the bloodied cutlass.

“What is happening?!” Roger demanded.

“Near as I can figure,” Tarrence said, checking his instruments…  “We’ve slipped into some kind of time warp.  Somehow, we’re passing through our own history.”

“I think he’s right,” Julia said, regaining her senses enough to run a computer analysis.  “The temporal readings have balanced twice, then disappeared into dead space each time.  We seem to be randomly intersecting with the time stream, slipping in and out of normal time.”

Another white flash.

This time, she found herself at a kind of open air market, a noisy crowd of people in 18^th century garb.  And a barker putting human beings on display…black men and women paraded before the crowd in chains.  “Good strong men for the fields,” he shouted.  “Fine young ladies to serve in your households.  What am I bid?”

“This is Boston,” Tarrence said, checking his hand comp.  “1752.”

“What the hell’s going on?” Roger asked.

“Can’t you see?” Tarrence asked.  “It’s a damn slave auction!”

“What?” Roger’s face twisted in disbelief.  “Here, in the cradle of the American revolution?  This can’t be right.”  Another white flash, and they were back on the bridge.

And, so it went, one time shift after another.  Black soldiers in blue Union uniforms storming Confederate lines.  Thousands gathered in Washington, D.C. a century later.  “I have a dream today,” a black man said to cheering crowds.

“By any means necessary,” another black man said to other cheering crowds.

 “Who were those men?” Roger asked as they shifted back to the bridge.  “I’ve never seen their faces before in history holos.  We have to be slipping through some kind of alternate timeline.  A parallel universe, different from our own.”

“Not according to these readings,” Julia said.  “A parallel timeline would have a different quantum signature.  It’s definitely our own past we’re seeing.”

“But, that’s impossible!” Roger insisted, his face flushed, his eyes wild.  “Those events never happened!  They can’t have.”

“Obviously, they did,” Tarrence said.  “We just saw them with our own eyes!”

“But, why aren’t they recorded in our history texts?”  Roger asked.

Another white flash.  Black protesters gathered around a police line protecting an incinerator where books were being burned.

“We’re in Dallas,” Tarrence said.  “2054.”

A huge image of a white man’s face appeared on a gigantic public telescreen.  Julia vaguely remembered him from her high school history.  A little-remembered U.S. president of that period.  “The Supreme Court has correctly decided that free speech does not extend to history, as public interest outweighs the 1^st Amendment,” the man’s voice boomed through multiple loudspeakers.  “Histories that vilify the white race will fill our children with self-loathing and divide our society, perpetuating endless recrimination and alienation between the races.  Let us celebrate the heroism and nobility that made America great!  These dark chapters of our past are over and done with, and meaningless now.  They are best forgotten.”

Another white flash, and they were back on the bridge.  “We’re coming up fast on our own time,” Julia said with relief, checking the readings.  “And, we’re merging back into the timeline again.  We’ll be home soon.  Whether by our own miscalculation, or by deliberate design of our alien friends…the wormhole’s turned us back and spit us out.  We’re headed back where we started.  Brace for splashdown!”  The ship trembled as it exited the wormhole and hit the ocean surface.  “South Pacific, 2122,” she said, checking the instruments.  “According to the chronometer, it’s been just a few seconds since we left.”

“The wormhole just closed behind us,” Tarrence said, checking his instruments.

 Julia checked the computer records.  “And, we’ve got quite a story to tell.  Our personal vid recorders were on the whole time and uploaded everything into the onboard database.  We’re carrying a living history.”

Roger blanched white.  “Dear God…delete the records!  All of them.  Now!”  He lunged for the nearest computer panel.

“What?!” Tarrence exclaimed, blocking his path.  “Have you lost your mind?  We have to bring back what we’ve learned.”

“It would destroy everything!  It would plunge our society into chaos!  No one can ever know.  Get out of my way!”

“Over my dead body.”

Julia gasped as Roger pulled a gun.  “Don’t make me, Tarrence,” he warned.

Julia quickly re-set the navigational controls, turning the sub sharply to port.  As Roger lost his footing, Tarrence tackled him.  They struggled for the gun.  Julia gasped as a muffled shot rang out.  She felt both horrified and relieved as Roger fell limp to the deck.  Tarrence took Roger’s pulse.  He looked up at Julia.  “He’s dead.”

She lowered her head into her hand, leaning against the panel.  Horrible as it seemed, she actually felt a gigantic weight had been lifted from her shoulders.  She felt Tarrence’s strong hand gently stroke her shoulder.  “I’m sorry,” he said.

“Don’t be,” she said, looking up into his strong, handsome face and stroking his hand.  “I’ve decided.  I’m not going to abort our baby.”

He took her hand.  “You’re sure this is what you want?  I’ve made it clear how I feel, but… you know this means prison or exile for both of us.”

She stood and put her arms around him, kissing him full on the lips.  “I feel freer than I have in… as long as I can remember.  Besides… I’m hoping once those records go public, things are going to change.  And, long overdue.”

Retreat into Darkness...

 

And, for the first time...the Supreme Court has revoked a fundamental civil right of personal choice and autonomy by sending the question of a woman's right to an abortion back to the states.

Battle lines are already forming between Federal authority and state sovereignty.  Women of low income...primarily women of color...will be hit the hardest in states that have already banned abortion to one degree or another. 

What fundamental human rights might next be declared nothing more than the  opinions of individual states?  Segregation?  Slavery?  The very right to live if you're LGBTQ?

It isn't just social issues on the line, though.  The highest court is already weighing in on issues of gun control and climate change, in direct challenges against Federal authority.  Issues of national security...maybe even the survival of the environment and consequently of the human race itself...are being decided not by law enforcement agencies, scientists or even by the popular will of the people.  But, by ideologue judges appointed as operatives of social change by reactionary politicians and their political bases, which look on the verge of all-out rebellion.

In an already divided country...one in which the validity of the electoral process was recently challenged by a large faction, threatening the peaceful transition of power...these growing divisions look like sparks waiting to ignite the fuel.

This short story takes it to the limit.  How far away now is the dividing line between speculative fiction and reality?

****

 

JUGGERNAUT

 

2051 A.D.

Bradley’s blood raced as Washington D.C. burned.

The teeming mobs roared like a pack of wild animals, firing their automatic weapons into the air as the capitol dome went up in flames.  Bradley’s mind exploded like a thunderbolt as he raised his hands, the heat of the fire washing over him as his voice boomed over the crowd through a hundred hovering audio drones. 

“My fellow Americans…” The mob fell into a hush at the sound of his voice.  He was awed at the sway he held over them.  “The 2^nd American Revolution is successful!  The elite has been purged, the abortion mills have been destroyed, the perversions of birth control and sexual deviancy have been eradicated, our right to bear arms is vindicated, and American industry is free.  The coal plants are open, the oil flows…American power is revived.  America is ours again!”  The crowd exploded.  His heart throbbed as they chanted his name.  He saw the dead bodies in the distance, dangling from hangman’s ropes and reveled in his own power.

His mind flooded with memories.  Once his hand-picked judges had handed the power of life and death to the state politicians, the battle was won.  They’d armed the masses…his hand-picked rabble rousers had led the uprisings.  The cities had burned, and martial law had made his power absolute.

Now, he could build…

***

2073 A.D.

Bradley shuddered and slammed his fist into his desk as the entire underground complex seemed to tremble around him.  He cursed as he looked up at the domed ceiling.  The distant bombing seemed to get closer every day.  The immense plasma screens around him conveyed the scenes of surface bombardment from the Euro-Asian space platforms, numbers scrolling across the screens totaling the daily body counts…He snickered, switching the views to the underground monitors.

Construction of the subterranean cities was well underway.  The coal plants had been moved deep underground where the bombing couldn’t reach them.  Construction round the clock.  Jobs, jobs, jobs.  He almost laughed, shaking his head.  The idiots worked themselves to death building cities they’d never live in.  Cities only for winners like him.  They barely noticed the flooded coastal cities, the tornadoes leveling the heartland, the droughts.  Of course not, he thought, switching the screens to scenes of black ghettoes burning.  Crematoria spewing the ashes of assorted undesirables into a darkening sky.  Police squads kicking in the door of every domicile where a pregnancy implant monitor had gone dead. They were too busy killing each other to notice the old world was dying.  The juggernaut of progress couldn’t be stopped.

“By the Chancellor’s leave…”

He started as his latest Chief of Staff, Jason Barrett entered unannounced.  “What is it, Barrett,” he grumbled, switching off the screens, irritated at having his daily entertainment interrupted.

Barrett’s forehead was creased.  The dark circles under his eyes and his gravelly voice revealed he hadn’t been getting much sleep.  “Chancellor…we need more conscription.  The black and Hispanic insurgents are getting increasingly organized, and arms are getting to them from the Euro-Asian Alliance.  And, refugees from the storm areas are beginning to join them.  I’ll need at least…”

“Forget conscription,” Bradley said, pouring himself a bourbon.  “I need all the manpower I can get for the construction projects.  Organize more militias, for God’s sake.  There’s no shortage of dead weight up there, and all of it armed.  Use some of it.”  He tossed one back and poured himself another, smiling at the buzz.

Barrett sighed.  “Sir…they’re getting hungry.  Hungry people get desperate fast.”

Bradley swirled the ice in his glass.  “Barrett…you forget the perfectly balanced nature of the times in which we live.”  He patted the other man’s shoulder and whispered close by his ear.  “As half the population shrinks, the other half gets fed.”  He switched one screen to a scene of a food production mill where the dead bodies of a generation he’d saved from the abortion mills were being processed into raw protein food stuffs.  He chuckled, taking a swallow.  “Increase food production.  More mass executions of the homeless, more anti-homosexuality sweeps.  Just step up food production.”  He switched the screen to moaning porn scenes.

“One other thing, Chancellor…We’ve received another entreaty from the E.A.A.  They’re willing to negotiate a cease-fire if we cut back on coal and oil.”

“Absolutely not!  How many times do we have to go over this?  If we cut back on fossil fuels, the economy suffers.  Besides, we’d see hydro and solar cropping up all over the continent before you know it.  No…centralized power grids are key to maintaining control.  You said yourself rebellions are flaring up.  The last thing we need now is to cut back on the juice.  Besides…”  He finished off his drink.  “The more of them that die in the heat and the storms, the less we have to worry about.”  He smiled, slapping Barrett’s shoulder.

“Dad…”

He grinned broadly as his daughter Rachel entered.  Radiantly beautiful as ever.  So like her late mother.  He found himself having to fight off certain urges where Rachel was concerned.  “Kitten…always a pleasure, but I’m a little busy right now…”

“Dad, this is important!” Her lovely face flushed as she stamped her foot and raised her voice.  “I’m trying to throw the biggest party of the season, and your security staff is telling me I can’t have my friends from Houston or the New York platforms, because of travel restrictions?!”

“Everything’s locked down because of the insurgency, Miss,” Barrett explained.

“I wasn’t asking you!  Dad…”

Just as Bradley was about to pour himself a stronger drink, Claudette…his lovely black attendant entered, in one of her sexiest form-fitting mini-dresses.  One he’d had designed personally.  He looked her over and nodded approvingly.

“Is now a bad time?” Claudette asked.  “This is our usual hour.”

“It’s never a bad time for you, my dear.”  He licked his lips and smiled.  “That will be all for now, Barrett.”

“What about my party, dad?” Rachel demanded.  “Is your little whore more important than me?”

He rolled his eyes, wondering what expensive gift would placate her this time.  Alarm bells and strobing red lights shrieked across his nerves. Barrett put his phone to his ear, sweat glistening on his forehead as he switched the screens to a scene of explosions in the coal mines… black and Hispanic slave workers armed with assault rifles blazing away, killing their overseers.   Bradley’s blood boiled.  “Barrett…what in hell…?”

The man stared at him, the color draining out of his face.  “E.A.A. commandoes smuggled weapons to the slaves.  There are revolts in every mine and explosions spreading towards the main power plants.”

“Where the hell were your guards?!” he shouted, his face flushed, his voice cracking.

“The security gates were opened and the guard units moved on your authorization, Chancellor.”

“What the hell are you talking about?  I never authorized…”  He froze, as in a nightmare as Rachel pulled a plasma gun and pumped three rounds into his stomach.  The pain was blinding, the room spinning.  He barely saw Claudette pull her own gun and blow Barrett’s head off before he hit the floor.  Bradley’s hand came away from his stomach drenched in blood.

“You’re so careless with your security access codes, father,” Rachel said with a grin.  “Did I do all right, Darling?” she asked, stroking Claudette’s long, luxuriant hair.

“You were perfect, my love,” Claudette replied, sliding her arm around Rachel’s slender waist and kissing her fully on the lips.  “But, we have to hurry.  The shuttle’s waiting.”

Bradley’s mind was reeling, his heart fluttering.  “Why?” he whispered.

“Claudette’s under cover for the E.A.A., of course,” Rachel answered with a sneer.  “They’ve granted me asylum in Europe in exchange for my help.  I understand Paris is lovely this time of year. Give mom my regards.”  She smiled as she pointed her gun at his head and fired.

And, the death toll continues...

 

The killings go on... the automatic rifle the weapon of choice.  Sometimes, the motive is madness.  Sometimes racism or other extremist ideology.  But, the death is constant.

After the most recent mass slaughter, a degree of bipartisan cooperation unseen in Washington D.C. for decades materialized.  For a minute, anyway.  Whether it will lead to any meaningful step towards the restoration of sanity in this country remains to be seen.

Firearms helped shape our history and just may be the end of it, if our society dissolves into a lawless frontier.

This short story illustrates an extreme (hopefully fantastic) scenario of just where America might be going if gun rights ultimately take precedent over human rights.

****

 

SANCTUARY

“West 20 degrees, Feng,” Marjani ordered, her eyes fixed on the computer analysis of the projected flight path of the last expedition to venture into the North American continent.

“Acknowledged, Commander,” her Chinese helmsman replied.

 Marjani recalled her history…in the old pre-globalist days, the ancient Americans had worshiped a fire-arms culture.  It became all-consuming to them, dominating their way of life even as it destroyed their civilization.  Other nations, including those of Marjani’s native Africa, had instituted common-sense gun control legislation.  But, North America had ultimately dissolved into utter chaos.

As the ship circled in and descended, she saw their destination on the forward viewscreen.  Across the desolate plains of ruined ancient cities…there is was.  The dome.  Truly the crowning achievement of a dead civilization.  Immense as a mountain range, it straddled the continental heartland.  The only human built structure in existence big enough to be seen from space.  “Any contact?”

“Negative, Commander,” Cibor, the European com officer replied.

“But, this was the last known position of the European Coalition expedition, just before they disappeared?”

“Affirmative.  I’m scanning on all frequencies, but I can’t be sure radio communication is even possible through the dome.”

“Probably not,” Meera, the young Indian historian said.  “By all indications…towards the end of the late nationalist period, the Americans had completely isolated themselves.  Not even radio contact with the outside world was possible.  The dome was designed to insulate them from what they called ‘foreign dominance.’  Primarily, they wanted to escape the gun control legislation of the new United Nations Assembly.”

“There’s the first ship!” Feng exclaimed, pinpointing the Euro expedition airship on the viewscreen, brackets flashing around a point near the edge of the dome.

“Enhance 40%,” Marjani ordered, the landed airship growing larger on screen.   “That’s the Artemis, all right.  ‘Looks intact.  Put us down right next to it, Feng.  All hands, brace for landing.”  She felt the vibration as the landing jets engaged, the ship touching down with a slight shudder.  “Deploy scanning drones.”

“No sign of movement,” Jean-Paul, the tactical officer reported, the aero-drone images of the surrounding area appearing on split sections of the viewscreen.  “However…” he zoomed in on one section with a hand-held remote.  What looked like a breached hatchway appeared on screen.  “It looks like they gained access to the dome through there.”

Marjani studied the situation.  “All right…Minimal contingent.  We don’t want to kick over any hornet’s nests if we can avoid it.  Meera, Isabella…You’re with me.  Beamers set on heavy stun force.  Jean-Paul, you have the bridge.”

The man looked at her with a furrowed brow.  “Commander…I respectfully request that I be allowed to…”

“Denied,” she said firmly, suiting up.  “I need you here.  But, have a squad standing by, armed with stun beamers.  We may lose contact once we’re inside.  If we’re not back in 20 minutes, come in fast.  Clear?”

“Affirmative, Commander,” he said grudgingly, a frown on his stern black face.

Marjani climbed down the airship’s ladder, the harsh wind howling through the surrounding ruins.  Her breath rasped through her helmet, fogging the glass of her faceplate.  Dust pelted her suit as she and the other two women made their way into the shadowed interior of the dome.  They turned on their helmet lights, the gloomy darkness swallowing them as the faint light of the entrance faded behind them.

“Air musty, but breathable,” Isabella, the South American anthropologist reported, checking her scanner.  “No dangerous microbes or toxins detected.”

Marjani cautiously lifted her face plate and winced in disgust, the ancient stench of decay and rot choking her.  It was like stepping into a charnel pit.  She threw her light across the rusted, decayed wreck of shattered metal and gutted instrument panels all around her.  Layers of dust all around.  “How old are these ruins, Meera?”

“About 3000 years at best estimate, Commander,” the young woman said, her voice a tense whisper.  “This was the last outpost of technology towards the end.  A haven from the gang wars, for the wealthy elite.  But, as you see…long since cannibalized for raw survival.  Civilization clearly fell inside, too.”

“Commander, we’ve just lost contact with the ship,” Isabella declared.  “However…I’m picking up a signal from the sub-dermal emergency tracker of one of the expedition members.  Half a kilometer due east.”

“Beamers at the ready,” Marjani ordered.  “Isabella, you take point.  Meera and I will cover the flanks.”  She watched every shadow as they advanced in the gloom, fighting to keep her breathing steady.  “Isabella…Have your people in the South American Federation sent no expeditions this far north?”

“None that have returned, Commander,” the young Latina replied.  “There have been rumors of wild cannibal tribes in these parts, but nothing definite.”

Marjani started as something moved in the shadows, red eyes blazing in the darkness as the thing lunged.  She fired, a shrill, inhuman scream lancing to her marrow like a cold skewer.  She caught a glimpse of something shaggy as the flash of the energy blast faded.  A cold chill ran through her as her heart started beating again.  “You both okay?”  Both women exhaled, replying in the affirmative.  Marjani threw her light over the thing.  Something like a rodent.  But, huge.  Over a meter long, with straggly fur and three-inch curved fangs.  “What in hell?”

“Clearly, a mutant,” Meera said, breathlessly.  “It seems the vermin are evolving towards becoming the dominant lifeform.”

“Stay close, stay alert,” Marjani said, sweat stinging her armpits as they advanced into a dim, growing light coming from a section ahead.

They emerged from the dark tunnels into a wide, open chamber.  Rusted, abandoned machinery choked with thick weeds and underbrush.  Artificial light shined down from an arching ceiling high overhead.  “Atomically powered lighting,” Meera explained.  “Clearly designed for hydroponic agriculture.  The farming equipment’s obviously long since fallen into disrepair and the crops have gone to seed, but the reactors are still running.”

 Isabella shouted as some horrible multi-legged organism…something like a centipede, but nearly a meter in length crawled by.  “Another mutation?” she asked.

Marjani looked around, seeing winged insects, like mosquitos, but nearly half a meter long, fluttering about.

“I’m picking up low-level radiation,” Meera  said.  “Radiation leaks increasing over 3 millennia in a closed biosphere would account for this level of mutancy.”

“Are we in danger?” Marjani asked, fighting to keep her voice steady.

“The radiation levels are too low to do us any harm over short periods, but I wouldn’t advise a lengthy stay.”

“Have no fear.  Which way now, Isabella?”

“Through there.”

They pushed through clinging vines and brambles into another section.  Ruined industry.  Gutted factories.  What looked like wrecked battle drones covered in thick layers of dust.  In open areas, metal wreckage had been piled up, forming what looked like barricades, covering makeshift shelters.  Like primitive forts.  Marjani ran her hand across jagged holes in sheets of metal.  Bullet holes, she realized.

“They turned on each other at the end,” Isabella declared.  “Their food supply probably ran low, so they split into factions and fought over what was left.”  She picked up what looked like a crudely fashioned metal club.  “When the industry collapsed, when the ammunition was spent, they reverted to hand-to-hand combat.”

They all looked up, Marjani’s blood running ice cold as a scream echoed through the chambers.  They all ran in the direction of the scream.  The sound of multiple voices resounding in the rhythm of some savage chant grew louder as they neared the entrance to a lower chamber.

They stopped, looking on a scene out of a nightmare.  In a wide, torchlit chamber, a crowd of hideously deformed, pale little primitives in rough animal skins clustered about a towering statue.  An immense bronze figure of a man holding a primitive rifle aloft.  “En-Rah!” they all chanted in unison.  “En-Rah!  En-Rah!  En-Rah!”  A man was dragged forward by those crooked little savages.  A man in a European Coalition uniform.  Marjani gasped as a stack of wood and brambles was gathered around the poor man’s feet as he was tied to a pole.

“They’re going to sacrifice him?” she asked in a whisper.

“To their ‘god,’" Meera whispered.   "Since they fell back into primitivism, their gun culture seems to have degenerated into a pseudo-religion.”

The captive screamed as one of the primitives brought a torch toward his pyre.  Marjani shouted as she fired.  The stun blast knocked the little creature down, the torch falling from his hand.  The other savages gasped and drew back as the three women bounded down the steps, firing warning bursts into the air.  “En-Rah,” the creatures all whispered in awe, falling to their knees, apparently at the sight of guns.

“Untie him,” Marjani ordered.  “I’ll cover you.”  As Meera and Isabella freed the captive, the mutants snarled in rage and attacked en masse.  Marjani fired directly into the crowd, stunning several of the creatures into unconsciousness.  Some were frightened off, but the rest kept coming, brandishing primitive spears and clubs.  Marjani’s heart raced.  Bursts of energy blasted through the wild mob, multiple creatures falling.  The rest screamed in terror and scattered into the ruins.  Marjani looked up, heaving a sigh of relief as Jean-Paul’s strike team came bounding down the stairs, stun beamers blazing.  “That’s enough!” she shouted, holding up a hand.  “Hold your fire.  I don’t think they’ll be back.  Well done.”  She holstered her beamer.

“Are you all right?” she asked the man they’d saved.

He nodded, trembling.  “Yes,” he said in a strangled whisper.  “Thank you.”

“The rest of your team?”

He shook his head, burying his face in his hands.

“Get him back to the ship.  We’re getting out of here.”  She looked at the monstrous statue and brushed a layer of dust away from the plaque at the pedestal.

Three letters stood out in bold relief:  NRA. 

After Roe v. Wade...

 The United States Supreme Court may shortly overturn Roe v. Wade, the historic decision which secured a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy.  Half a century of basic freedom may soon come to an end.

Chief Justice Alito's philosophy is that this decision is not an inalienable right of the individual, but the province of state politicians.  One has to wonder, if a right of bodily autonomy is not considered a constitutional right, what is?  What next may be left to the mercy of local state politics and self-serving politicians catering to populist sentiment?  Marriage equality?  Basic human rights for LGBTQ people?  How about even racial and religious equality?

In the near future, if the right to abort a pregnancy is left to the states...if some states allow abortion and others don't...what then?  Legislation has been proposed already that would literally equate abortion with homicide.  If that becomes the law in some states, will those states actually stop pregnant women from crossing their borders to obtain an abortion elsewhere?  Could abortion actually be punishable by death?

If  state's rights are to be considered virtually absolute in the case of abortion, how far could this go?

This short story proposes an extreme possibility which hopefully will remain the stuff of science fiction.

*************

CRUCIBLE

Tara roared as she fired, men falling from the machine gun turrets atop the wall guarding the Texas border.  The hatred raging through her blood was intoxicating, pounding through her brain like bomb bursts as she swung the machine gun, the copter turning.

Focus, she commanded herself, concentrating through the red haze.  Switching to interceptor RPG’s, she linked the A.I. through her scanner goggles, targeting the enemy choppers moving to intercept the Federacy tanks.  She tasted the salt of her sweat on her upper lip as she took out one copter after another.  She found herself reveling in the deaths of the Christian Nationalist pilots, and winced in disgust.  She hated what she was becoming, but she couldn’t stop.  Their hate was a scorching fever, and it had infected her.  She could quell the fire in her brain only by killing them.

She cheered as the tanks breached the wall, a tide of refugees making it across the border into New Mexico.  EMERGENCY, the auto pilot intoned as the chopper’s gas tanks burst into flame, punctured by ground fire.  SEVERE DAMAGE.  EVACUATE.  Tara cursed as the A.I. automatically swung the chopper downward.  She didn’t wait for an easy jump distance; She knew the sooner she was off, the sooner the A.I. would switch to secondary combat protocol and aim itself at the nearest enemy command post.

She jumped, groaning with the impact as she tucked and rolled across the dusty ground.  She came up firing with two handguns.  This is more like it, a part of her mind exclaimed with a perverse pleasure as she killed the C.N. scum firing at the refugees.  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her chopper crash into a hovering enemy command heliplatform, the two dissolving into a searing fireball.  She laughed in madness, the killing fever taking her.  She fired and fired, dead enemy soldiers falling until her ammo was spent.

She drew the serrated blade from her boot as it came down to hand-to-hand. The hulking swine with the eagle tattoo on his thick neck came at her, a sneer crossing his ugly face.  He licked his lips as he drew his blade.  If this was it, this was damn well how she wanted to go out.  Face-to-face with the pigs who’d killed her sister and tortured Tara in the camps.

The swine snarled as he lunged.  She winced as she spun, his blade grazing her shoulder.  She thrust, skewering his kidney.  He groaned, swinging backward.  She ducked and stabbed him again, cutting through the flab and muscle of his ample mid-section.  He roared in pain, his black-gloved hand clenching his knife as he swung.  She saw stars as the hilt of his knife connected with her head.  Flat on her back, she shook her head, his wild-eyed, savage face glaring down at her as he raised his knife over his head with both hands.  She kicked him in the groin and rolled.  He doubled over, then came after her again, his teeth bared, sweat streaming down his bald head.  She threw dirt in his face and reached for her knife where it lay on the ground.  She knew she wouldn’t reach it in time.  She thought of her sister as the bastard closed in.

Gushing red holes formed a line across the man’s chest as the sound of an assault rifle cut through the hot midday air.  As the enemy soldier fell dead, Tara looked up at the woman on the passing tank, holding the smoking rifle.  A smile spread across Tara’s face as she recognized the girl’s face.  “Steph!” she shouted, getting to her feet as Stephanie tossed her the rifle.  Swinging onto the tank, Tara laid down cover fire, taking out more C.N. troopers as they advanced.

As the tank cleared the wall into Federacy territory, Tara’s heart leapt as she saw more Federacy tanks moving up fast, a solid line approaching, Federacy flags flapping in the hot wind.  She held on tight as the tank swiveled around, joining the advancing line as the Federacy tanks opened fire.  The air vibrated, thunder blasting through her chest as sections of the wall collapsed.  Federacy sonic jets roared in, long-range air-to-airs taking out enemy choppers moving in.  Tara cheered and held her rifle high and proud as the Christian Nationalist troops retreated.

She turned to Stephanie who sat there on the turret, smiling at her.  “Thanks,” Tara said, brushing a wisp of hair out of the other young woman’s eyes and vividly remembering the day they’d met.  The day Stephanie’s unit had liberated Tara from the C.N. conversion camp in Utah, years ago.

“Missed you, babe,” Stephanie said.

As they kissed, Tara found herself trying to remember how many times she’d broken up with this girl.  As usual, she couldn’t.

                                                                                ***

Tara exhaled a stream of cannabis cigarette smoke into the cool night air, firelight washing over the sign on the Christian Nationalist side of the half-shattered wall.  A huge, enlarged photo of a first trimester fetus, with the caption in bold letters:  LEAVE HERE TO KILL YOUR CHILD, AND DIE WITH HIM.  She lit the corner of the poster with her lighter and watched it burn.  She walked past the bonfires where the Christian Nationalist flags were being burned, the white cross against the stars and bars shriveling in the flames, the firelight illuminating the Federacy Flags being hung.  The red and white stripes and rainbow crescent and green-and-blue earth…and that blue field with precious few stars left.  How long would the Federacy be able to hold this territory, she wondered.  How many times had it changed hands already, and at the cost of how many lives?

“More damn’ Russian guns,” a Federacy grunt muttered as he helped load captured enemy ordnance into trucks for shipment.

“That’s ‘cause we bombed the hell out of the C.N. arms factories in Dallas, bro,” another Federacy soldier said with a smile.

“Yeah, I know.  I just wish our dear Chinese allies were as generous as Ivan.”

Amen to that, Tara thought as she walked on.

They were still clearing away the dead bodies.  She turned away, wincing in revulsion as the firelight fell on the dead, ash-pale face of one of the refugees who didn’t make it across…a girl, late teens maybe…one of thousands of pregnant girls trying to get to freedom.  Tara clenched her fist as she remembered her sister Karen had saved countless others like that one when she ran the underground railroad into the free states.  The C.N. bastards had publicly executed her for it in front of cheering crowds in Selma.  Remember all the ones we did save, Tara reminded herself as she unclenched her fist and walked on.  At least the poor girl died quick, she thought.  Unlike the ones they caught alive.  Those, they grew to term in the camps, then butchered like animals, cutting them open without anesthesia to extract the babies.  Her stomach turned as she remembered what she’d seen when her unit had liberated the camp in Ohio.  The gutted bodies stacked carelessly in the crematoria…

She doubled over and vomited.  She leaned back against the wall and cried, slumping to a seated position.  She hated herself for that.  When she’d screamed in anguish, convulsing from the electric shocks in the conversion camp, she’d promised herself those pigs would never see her cry.  Damn, they were winning.  They were killing her by inches, and she couldn’t stop them.  No matter how many of them she killed, it would never be enough.  She heard gunfire in the night, and recognized it for what it was.  Firing squads, executing the damned C.N. butchers who’d killed so many like that girl, and anyone who’d tried to help them.  She’d volunteered for such firing squads in Louisiana.  In Mississippi.  In Tennessee.  She’d lost count of how many notches she’d carved into her rifle stock.  It would never be enough.  More of them just kept coming, and coming.  She slumped her head back, the tears streaming down her cheeks.

She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up.

“Hey, babe,” Stephanie whispered, sitting down beside her and putting her arm around her shoulders.  “Finally got a little R&R.  C’mere.”  She kissed Tara on the head, wiping away her tears.

Tara rested her head on Steph’s shoulder.

“Share?  I could use a hit.”

Tara handed her the smoking joint.

Stephanie took a long drag and exhaled.  “Mmmm, that’s good.  Bless our Mexican allies.”

“Tell anybody about this, and you’re dead,” Tara warned, taking back the joint and taking a drag.

“Same old Tara,” Steph said, putting both arms around her.  “Won’t allow yourself the luxury of being human.  Look…it’s not going to last forever, y’know.”

“Feels like it already has.”

“Buck up, soldier.  Have you heard?  Word just came down from the G.I.E. in Montreal…The Federacy has officially merged with the new Canadian Republic.  We’re the North American Coalition now.  The new Human Rights Charter is being drafted as we speak.”

“Hooray.”  She took another drag, frustrated that she just couldn’t get stoned enough to kill the pain.

Steph took the joint from her and took a puff.  “Look…with more refugees streaming into the free states and Canada every day, the brain-drain and worker shortage is starving the C.N. bastards out.  Our weapons keep getting better, and those dead heads are slipping back into the stone age.  Plus, the storms are killing them, and winning more recruits for the eco-guerrilla cadres.  We’re gonna’ win this, babe.  The damn’ Russians can’t keep propping them up forever, and fight the Polish Resistance at the same time.”

“Great.  So, in two years, we’ll be fighting to liberate this country from the Chinese.”

“Those tired old men in Beijing can’t hold on forever, either.  Not with their eco-revolution in full swing.  Who knows?  In five years, when this continent pulls together, we may hook up with the new European Union, arm the Chinese rebs, bomb the coal plants and save this sorry excuse for a world.”

Tara stretched out, her head in Steph’s lap.  “How do you do it?” she whispered, looking up at her.  “How do you stay alive inside, even through all this?”

Steph put out the joint and lay down beside her.  “My mom was also my social studies teacher.  She used to say, ‘Life at its worst is a crucible.  Everything it burns away isn’t worth saving.  What survives is what the future is built on.’”  She came down on her as they kissed.

Tara felt her unfastening her clothes.  The pain and the hate faded as Stephanie gently stroked her face.  Stephanie was like a cool, soothing balm, her love washing the hatred from Tara’s blood.  Tara moaned in pleasure…the love flowed through her, quelling the fever, the rage…the despair faded like smoldering embers in a cool rain.

Love survived the crucible, she thought.  That, they could never kill.